^ p -v^,. .-^^ -^' .j^-'C^ ^ .^N^ ,#' V . "^ v\^' 7 •^, 'V.''^v-^:° ,v^^''V■■ ^' >*r ■*■ .,\' .^ ■^. ■=^c.,^ .-^-' » O * x"^' A^ V ./', .0,^-^^ ^* <^'''^. ^^ -^t ,C^^ .V^' 'J' -o<^^ ^^^ ^^ ^ o'^ \V ^^^ v^^ ■i'mJ.f ■V .p ^ -;: .. N (, „ •/ hm.^^^ w "^.s- xV -P. V- ^ 'V - .. 1 %v .^^^ fe^s*. .^■" ^ 'c 0' P^-iyCL,'^^ RURAL RHYMES, Talks and Tales of Olden Times, BEING A Collection of Poems and 01d=Time Stories, GRAVE, HUMOROUS, DIDACTIC, SENTIMENTAL, AND DESCRIPTIVE, WRITTEN AT DIFFERENT TIMES AND UNDER DIFFERENT CIRCUMSTANCES, IVIARTIN RICB, LONE JACK, IVIO. THIRD EDITION, ENLARGED AND IMPROVED. KANSAS CITY : HUDSON-KIMBERLY PUB. CO 1893. 2^ w^Cp^ Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year One Thousand Eight Hundred and Ninety-three, By MARTIN RICE, In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C. INDEX. [Page. BIOGRAPHICAIv 9 A HOOSIER'S TRAMP 13 The Old Cabin Home 48 Talk to the Settlers of Jackson, Clay, Cass, and Platte .... 62 IS THE WORLD ANY WORSK ? 72 Talk of the Oneida Indians, Sent by Their Chiefs to the Leg- islature OF New York, in 1788 74 Give Me Liberty, or Give Me Death 79 THE FALL OF THE OLD MILL 83 OLD AND NEW FASHIONED SCHOOLS 88 PERSECUTION FOR OPINION'S SAKE 68 LAWYERS AND A LAWSUIT OF THE OLD TIME 99 THE MOTHER'S DYING CHARGE 104 WHAT I SAW OF ORDER NUMBER ELEVEN 105 A TALK OF THE OLDEN TIME IN INDEPENDENCE 124 RUTH AND NAOMI 131 THE CARRIER-BOY'S ADDRESS 134 THE JEWISH PILGRIM ; OR, AN AMERICAN JEW IN PALESTINE • 140 AN OLD SETTLER'S TALK 143 DE GOOD OLE TIMES IN NORF CARLINER 152 THE OLD MINISTER'S REMINISCENCES 157 THE OLD CAPTAIN OF 183S AND THE ROLL-CALL AT PLEASANT HILL, MO., IN 1881 , 159 SMALL CAUSES AND LARGE RESULTS 166 Liquid Stuff and Its Doings 173 DAVID'S FLIGHT FROM JERUSALEM AND THE DEATH OF ABSALOM 186 WRITTEN IN A LADY'S ALBUM 196 A WORLD OF CHANGE IS THIS . . : 197 DEATH OF A FRIEND IN 1S56 198 TO A FRIEND 199 THE SNOW-FLAKE I99 "VANITY OF VANITIES! ALL IS VANITY!" 201 PASSING AWAY 201 WHY SHOULD VAIN MORTALS BE PROUD ? 202 TWENTY YEARS PAST 204 I'M SITTING BY YOUR SIDE, MARY 206 LIFE AND DEATH 207 IMMORTALITY; OR, ANSWER TO LIFE AND DEATH 208 I'M STANDING BY YOUR GRAVE, MARY 209 HOPE DEFERRED 210 4 INDEX. Page. FAITH, HOPE, AND CHARITY 2" TO AN ABSENT SON. 212 WILLIE'S GRAVE 214 THE SONG OF THE SEA-SHELL 215 WHISKY, WHISKY— 'TIS A CURSE • 216 INTEMPERANCE 218 THE PROBLEM . . 226 THE FISHERMAN'S LAWSUIT 227 DORR MORRISON'S RIDE; OR, JOHN GILPIN THE SECOND .... 230 DOUBLE ACROSTIC 239 ACROSTIC 240 ACROSTIC 240 ACROSTIC 241 ACROSTIC 241 ACROSTIC— DOUBLE 242 PARODY ON A WELL-KNOWN HYMN 242 THE MOON . . 243 THE ORPHAN'S LOT 247 THE CHILD'S DREAM 249 THE EXILE'S LAMENT 250 YOU'VE SUNG OF GREENLAND'S MOUNTAINS 252 ABR.\HAM'S LAMENT 254 JOSEPH AND HIS BRETHREN. ... 256 DAVID AND GOLIATH 270 DAVID'S THREE MIGHTY MEN 287 DAVID'S LAMENTATION FOR SAUL AND JONATHAN 291 PREACHING TO THE NINEVITES 293 THE HORRORS OF CIVIL WAR. . 296 THE BATTLE OF LONE JACK 301 SPOTTSYLVANIA'S WILDERNESS . ■ . ; 303 THE HOMESICK SOLDIER '. 305 THE BANDIT'S DREAM; OR, THE HILLS OF SNI-A-BAR 306 THE DYING SOLDIER AT LONE JACK 3" THE SOLDIER FROM THE KANSAS LINE 315 THE FADED BANNER; OR, HOPE-FORLORN 319 THE WATCHMAN; OR, THE BURDEN OF DUMAH 321 THE CRUEL WAR IS OVER 323 THE LONELY TREE • • 325 THE PRISONER 329 SCENES OF MY CHILDHOOD 332 FORTY YE.IRS AGO -NOW AND THEN; OR, THE OLD MAN'S RETURN TO THE HOME OF HIS YOUTH 335 THE OLD-FASHIONED PRE-'VCHER 342 THE EARLY SETTLERS ' 344 THE CONTRAST 346 ADDRESS TO THE GRANGERS 349 LETTER TO AN EDITOR 351 THE EXODUS OF EIGHTEEN SIXTY-THREE ; OR, ORDER NUMBER ELEVEN 356 OLD-TIME REMINISCENCES 379 INDEX. 5 Page. the; country school lyceum 390 sermon by a little girl 392 to my grandson 394 anniversary oration 400 the muse of history 404 congratulations 408 a sunday'-school speech 411 the tramping poet 415 short sermon by a layman ... 417 the old meeting-house 420 uncle sam's botanic garden 427 geometrical problem 429 decor.\te their graves 430 half a century ago 432 pilate's wife's dream 440 sleeping yonder "445 anniversary' meeting 449 the spider-web problem 454 semi-centennial poem 456 evening musings 460 cutting down the old orchard 465 the poplar staff ' 468 the cedar walking-cane • 471 reading his own poems 472 regrets and congratulations 474 sweet, sweet home 476 a bivouac of the dead 477 reflections 481 new y'ear's night thoughts 483 to my grandson 486 pictures of memory 488 farewell to the old meeting-house 492 semi-centennial address ... 495 a layman's address 502 the story of the family oak 506 TO EMMA 519 INTR OD UCTION. The author of "RuRAiv Rhymeis and Poems prom O^he; Farm," in bringing this third edition before the public, returns his thanks for the favorable reception of the first and second. Those editions, amounting to 3500 copies, have, with little effort and no puffing or blowing, been sold, and there is still a demand and many calls for those simple home ballads of the plain Missouri farmer. The present volume, styled "Rurai, Rhymes and Tai^ksand Tales of Oi.den Times," in addition to the poems and olden-time stories of the sec.ondvolume,contains several other poems written in the same easy and simple style, said by. some to be the best of the author's writings. In reference to those talks and tales, the author desires to say that, though some of them are mixed with a little of fiction, the main incidents and ideas are substantially true, as many of the older citizens" of the localities can testify; the object in part being to give an account of the manners and customs of the men and women of fifty and sixty years ago, and to contrast the old times with the present ones. Hoping and believing that the new volume will meet with even more favor than either of the preceding ones, it is presented to an appreciative and generous public by the author. Martin Rice. lyone Jack, May, 1893. TO THE READER. Far from the city's noisy din, P'ar from its bustle and alarm, We had our being first within The limits of an humble farm ; From out its cool, sequestered shade, In different ways, at different times, We came ; and when together laid. Are simply styled the "Rural Rhymes." From out a toiling farmer's brain We had our birth — no matter when, If we can your attention chain, And edify the minds of men ; And though we may not soar as high As Milton's thoughts in former times, Oh, let it be no reason why You should not read the "Rural Rhymes." And though we may not live as did Old Homer's verse and Ossian's lays, L,et not our simple truths be hid By greater names of other days ; Though thousand years we may not live, As poems have from Eastern climes, May we a transient pleasure give To those who read the " Rural Rhymes." And though not gorgeously arrayed In soaring language, full and pure, Remember gorgeous colors fade, While simpler colors long endure; Then may the simple truths we speak Fall on the heart with pleasing chimes, And often may each reader seek ' New beauties in the " Rural Rhymes." Yours respectfully, M. Rice. BIOGRAPHICAL. Martin Rice, the author of "Rurai. Rhymes," etc., was the oldest of the seven sons and four daughters of Enoch and Mary Rice, and had his birth and early training in what is now Union County, then a part of Campbell, in East Tennessee, thirty miles north of Knoxville, near the present I^ost Creek post-office. His father, Enoch, being a farmer of small means, poor health, and a large family, had hard work to make the ends meet, and consequently his boys were (as they ought to have been) brought up to labor on the farm. Martin, however, born on the 2 2d of November, 1814, was sent to school at a very early age, and when six years old was pronounced the best reader of his age in all the country. But after this, for the want of school facilities or the pressing need of labor on the farm or help to his mother in the house, his schooling was irregular and somewhat neglected, and at the age of fourteen he quit school altogether, having attended school, from the age of five to fourteen, about thirty months, and at that time he says he had never seen the inside of a grammar. The last five months of his schooling in 1828 he studied arithmetic, and at the end of the term had got so far in "Pike" as to geometrical progression. But though his schooling ended at the age of fourteen, his studies did not. At his request his father bought him Murray's English Grammar, and this he studied without the aid of a teacher ; for his father, though a fair backwoods scholar of that day, had never studied gram- mar himself. About the same time his taste for writing began to manifest itself, and many a Sunday and rainy day, while other boys were amusing themselves at play, he spent the time in putting his thoughts on paper, both in prose and in rhyme. In the autumn of 1832 he was employed to teach a lO RURAL RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. district school for five mouths in Claiborne County, Teun., the first ever taught in the district under the first free-school law of the State, for which he was promised ten dollars per month, one-fourth of which he never received, and while teaching this school he paid his board by laboring on mornings, evening*, and Saturdays. The next summer his father sold his small farm for $800, and in the autumn with his family moved to Jack- son County, Mo., and in October, 1S33, entered 160 acres of Government land near Lrone Jack, a part of the farm on which Martin now resides. On this a cabin was soon built, and the family moved into it in November of the same year, a few days after the great meteoric shower. Before coming to Missouri his father had traded for a cheap set of surveying instruments and an old treatise on that science, thinking they might be of use in the new country to which he was moving, and the long even- ings of that winter were spent by Martin in studying the lessons of that old book, as the days were spent in grub- bing hazel and making rails. After assisting in opening and fencing a farm and planting a crop, he was hired to ■a neighboring farmer for two months at ten dollars per month, to be paid in the fall with pork. After this in the autumn he taught a short term of school, the second ever taught in what is now Van Buren Township in Jackson County. In the summer of 1835 he made a crop with an uncle near Independence, sold his crop in the fall, and with the money thus obtained (and some borrowed) entered land near his father's. On this he worked through the winter and sold it in the spring, and then entered land in Cass County (then called Van Buren). On the 3d day of April, 1836, he was married to Miss Mary I^yncli, of I^afayette County, and on the nth of the same month moved to his lately purchased home and commenced housekeeping, and here 'he resided as a farmer until the death of his wife in December, 1855. His father having died in 1 851, he sold out in Cass and bought the old homestead in 1856, where he still is. When he married and settled in Cass, or Van Buren, it was a county but recently organized and thinly settled. The first general election was held soon after, and he was BIOGRAPHICAL. 1 1 elected count}' surveyor, an office of no profit, which he held for three 5'ears. Politically, he has generally been in the minority, State and count}', and in consequence has not sought or held office, adopting the motto of Henry Clay, " Rather to be right than in office and ivrongy In 1846 he was chosen as justice of the peace and served four years, and the title of "Squire" sticks to him yet. In addition to his occupation as a farmer, he was engaged as a nurseryman, propagating fruit trees from 1849 to 1 88 1. Large numbers of the orchards of Jackson, Johnson, Lafayette, and Cass counties were grafted by the same hand that wrote the " Rural Rhymks" ; and he has often been heard to say that after he is dead and gone these orchards will remain to benefit the rising generation. During his labors on the farm for so many years he has found time to cultivate the mind as well as the soil and to pursue his studies, mathematics being his favorite one, in which he is said now to surpass many collegiate professors. Some things he claims to have discovered in mathematics not known before, or at least not laid down in the books. As has been said, he commenced writing poetry or rhyming at the age of fourteen. None of his j^outhful effusions have been preserved. From 1850 to 1876 occasional pieces were published in the county papers over the signature of "Phocion" and other noms ae pluvie, and in 1877 his "Rural Rhymes and Poems from the Farm" was published at the office of Ramsey, Millett & Hudson. That edition of 1 500, and another of 2000 pub- lished later, have all been disposed of years ago, mostly in Jackson and adjoining counties, but many copies have found their way to other States, and have been highly appreciated there as well as at home. Of Mr. Rice's six brothers and four sisters, all younger than he, only one brother and one sister are living : Henry H. Rice, at Manhattan, Kansas, and Louisa J. Snow, in Johnson County, Mo. His oldest brother, David, one of the early merchants of Cass Count}^, who died on the wajT' to California in 1849, is referred to in his poem "Twenty Years Past," and his youngest brother, Pryor, 12 RURAL RHYMES AND OI.DEN TIMES. wlio fell at Corinth in 1863, is supposed to be "The Soldier from the ICansas lyine." His mother, who after 1856 made her home with him, died in March, 1881. Of his four sons and five daughters, three of each are still living. His oldest son and second daughter died in infancy. His oldest daughter, Martha J. Tate, died in 1869, and her dying charge to her son, who is now a min- ister of the gospel at Sarcoxie, Mo., is one of the author's poems. His son Isaac L. lives in the southwestern part of Cass County, and his son Alvin B. in the northeastern corner of the same count}'; his youngest son, Marion, in Colorado. His oldest living daughter, Mary, with her hus- band, Wm L. Butler, and family, live with him and man- age the farm on which his father settled, as has been said, in 1833. His daughter Nancy Mitchell lives near Nor- wood, in Wright County, Mo., and his youngest, Elvira Mitchell, in Montana. Martin Rice is emphatically an old-fashioned farmer of the old-fashioned school, one who sometimes doubts whether the modern way of running things by steam is much better than running them in the old-fashioned man- ner. He united with the Baptist Church at Pleasant Garden, near lyone Jack, in 1841, and afterward trans- ferred his membership to the lyone Jack Church of Mis- sionary Baptists, of which church he is still a member, and the one of longest standing in the body. As may be inferred from some of his poems, he was during the great civil war a steadfast friend of the Union, being then, as ever before, in a minority; but he man- aged to keep at home and on good terms with his neigh- bors who differed in opinion with him, frequently assist- ing and befriending them in their troubles, and being assisted and befriended by them in return. Pural Pf^ymes ar^d 0'^^^ Times. A HO OSIER'S TRAMP. Three Days' Travel through Western Missouri i7i. 1836, and Three Days over the Same Ground in 1880. CHAPTER I. In the spring of 1880, having been in poor health during the winter, I was advised by my physician to spend a few months in travel, as it was thought that this would be of more benefit to me than any medical treat- ment that I could receive. I immediately set about making preparations to leave my home on the White River, in Indiana, not as yet having fixed upon any particular line of travel, or the direction I should take. In looking over some of my old papers, with a view to arranging my affairs before leaving home, I picked up what appeared to be the remnant of an old memorandum book, written in pencil, and so worn that I could scarcely decipher the writing upon it. I soon saw, hovvever, that it was what remained of a diary that I had kept on a trip to the western part of Missouri in 1836. As I said, there was but a remnant left, and it con- tained the incidents only of three days of that journey. Those incidents or memoranda were briefly stated, and read thus : "October i. — Started after late breakfast, bidding our fat host good-by and paying fifty cents each. We had no road, but were directed in a northwest direction to an Indian trail which would lead us direct to Westport. Got lost and traveled several miles out of the way; finall)^ struck the trail and stopped at noon near the south line 14 RURAL RHYMEJS AND OLDEN TIMES. of Johnson County, at the house of Mr. Norris, and fed our horses. About sundown passed a mound, nearly round and quite high ; no house in sight. After dark lost the road again ; saw a light and found a small cabin in the prairie ; could not keep us, but put us in the road and sent us a mile further. Stayed with a young couple, lately married, living in Van Buren County. " October 2. — Paid our bill, fifty cents each, and pro- ceeded on our journey, still on the Indian trail, or Shaw- nee Trace. Found houses for a few miles, and came again into a large prairie; fell in with an old gentleman going to the Platte Purchase, and joined company, as he said he could pilot us a better waj^ Stopped on the Little Blue and had shoes put on horses. Stayed at Stayton's, near Independence ; went with the family to night meeting, or preaching. "October 3. — Paid lodging, seventy-five cents each; went on to Independence; met our pilot again; went on to Westport ; crossed the Missouri River at Westport I^anding. Stopped at night on Bee Creek with a friend of our traveling companion, who gave us all a hearty welcome." More than forty-three years had passed since that journey was made and that diary was written, but the incidents of those three days were yet fresh in my memory. They had impressed themselves at the time more forcibly upon my mind than the incidents of any other part of the journey, and it may have been for that reason that this scrap had been preserved. Before I had finished reading, my resolve had been taken to go over the same ground again in this my con- templated travel. At least, I resolved to proceed on the same route to Westport; thence through Kansas, Arkan- sas, and perhaps Texas. That trip has been made, and I have returned with restored health, and have resolved to write a narrative of that three days' journey in 1836 and its incidents, and also of three days over the same ground in 1880. I was then in my j^outli ; now I am old and gray- headed, verging on to my three-score and ten years. Then the country was new and thinly settled ; now it is comparatively old and populous. But to proceed : A HOOSIKRS TRAMP. 1 5 About the last of August, 1836, my friend and neigh- .bor, Frank Elmwood, informed me that he was think- ing of trying his fortune farther west. We had come from Virginia to Indiana, boys together; both had been married about eighteen months, and each had a small farm and a small family, on the V/hite River. Frank said the Platte Purchase, in Missouri, was said to be the garden-spot of the world; that it was now open for settlement, and settling up fast ; and asked me if I would not cut loose and go with him. After thinking and talking over the matter for some days, it was decided that we should go and look at the country before breaking up where we were. Our preparations were soon made, and we set out on horseback about the loth of September and proceeded leisurely to Vincennes, thence to St. lyouis, and from there in a southwest direction to the Kickapoo Prairie, in Greene County, where we had some Virginia acquaint- ances and some little business to transact. But as this sketch is only to treat of three da3's' travel, all else is hurriedly passed over. We left the Kickapoo Prairie, as well as I recollect, on the 28th of September, passing through the counties of Polk, Benton, and Rives (since called Henry), and, after passing the little, town of Clin- ton, missed our way, and night found us at the house of Mr. Clark Davis, on a stream called Big Creek. This Mr. Davis was almost a mountain of flesh, weighing, as he said, over four hundred pounds, but a genial, kind-hearted, and affable man. The country we had passed over, after leaving Spring- field, was thinl)^ settled, and a part of the way we had passed over bridle-paths, or settlement roads. The farms and the rude cabins were small, few, and far between. Our giant friend, with whom we tarried, informed us that a few miles to the north we would strike an Indian trail, called the Shawnee Trace, which would lead us direct to Westport, on the western line of the State and near the Missouri River. This trail, he said, was made by the Shawnee Indians in moving from the lower Mississippi to their homes on the Kan- sas. He pointed out the direction we should go, and we set out. In a short time, in crossing a stream on which some timber and brush were growing, we got turned 1 6 RURAL RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. round while seeking a crossing-place, and, as the day- was cloudy, took a wrong direction; and instead of going north, we afterwards found ourselves going nearly east. Several miles were passed and we realized the fact that we were lost on an almost boundless prairie. It was so cloudy and smoky that we could not see the sun, nor the streams of timbered land, if any such there were to be seen. About ten o'clock a solitary horseman was seen crossing our course at about right angles. We spurred up, in order to meet him, and found that he was follow- ing a small trail, or wagon track, through the tall grass; and on inquiring for the Shawnee Trace, he said he was a stranger there, but that in passing down the day before he had passed an old road, or trail, which he supposed was it, and that he thought it was only a short distance ahead. We turned our course and rode on together, through the rank grass. The stranger was a tall, good- looking young man, apparently thirty years of age, per- haps older ; was quite talkative, and told us that he lived in I^afayette County, near Greenton, and seemed desir- ous of finding out something of our residence and busi- ness in such a waste world. My companion, Frank, who had not spoken since first inquiring about the road, gave *my horse a cut with his switch, as I was about to answer some question that had been asked; and the sudden spring of the horse prevented an immediate answer. On my looking back, he gave me a look and a gesture, which said as plainly as they could say, "Be on your guard." I was somewhat surprised, as before that he liad been more open with strangers and less suspicious than I had been. I took the hint, how- ever, and answered the stranger's question by saying that we were from the Wabash country, and were visiting friends and looking at the country. In a short time we came to the old trail, and, taking the left-hand end, we parted company with the stranger and rode on. As soon as we were out of hearing, Frank, who had been riding behind, came to my side, and I asked for an explanation. "Didn't 3^ou know him?" said he. "It is that villain lyCSter." "What! John C. Lester? " "Yes," said he. "I knew him as soon as he opened his mouth to answer my question about the road. Where did he .say he lived? " A hoosikr's tramp. 17 "Near Greenton, I think." "Then," said Frank, "he will hear from me again, before we get back to the Wabash. By the bye, you were quick to take the hint." For some time we rode on in silence. Frank seemed, as I thought, to be planning some way to avenge himself of the wrongs he had received ; and my thoughts by the incident were carried back to Virginia, and were brood- ing over the scenes of my youth. That Frank had been deeply wronged by this man, I knew. By his oily speeches and insinuating address he had so played upon the credulity of Frank's father as to swindle him out of some thousands of dollars ; and, what was worse, had seduced a fair young cousin of Frank's, a school-mate of mine, and carried her off, no one knew where; we had not heard of them since. No wonder, then, that this little incident had set us both to thinking. About noon we came to a cabin on the road, and stopped to feed our horses and get dinner. We were told that Mr. Norris lived there, but that none of the family were at home, except a boy, who said he had just eaten all that was cooked. He, however, fed our horses, and told us it was twenty miles to the next house on the road. Our host of the night before had told us of this house of Norris's, and of the one twenty miles above; to which he said we could get before night, and where, he said, we would find a jolly, crankj^ old pioneer, by the name of I^angs- ton, with a family of boj^s as cranky as himself. Having rested our horses, we pursued our journey through the lonely prairie, and in a few miles passed a small stream, said to be the head of Bear Creek, on which some man had hauled together a set of house-logs by the road-side; but no other sign of humanity was to be seen. Late in the afternoon we came in sight of a high and round-looking knoll, or mound, on the prairie, toward which our trail led in a direct line ; we could see it from every little rise or eminence for miles ; and about sunset it was reached. The main travelled road passed round it on the south, but the original Indian path had passed directly over it. We rode on the direct straight path, up its steep side, to its rocky summit, from which an extensive view on all sides could be had. For miles, in evjry direction, the prairie was spread out before and around it, but no house —2— 1 8 RURAiv rhyme;s and olden timbs. was in sight. To the north, at the distance of two miles, perhaps, was seen what appeared to be a small corn-field; and far to the south were seen two or three smokes, ris- ing as if from chimneys; but no other sign of habitation. A short council was here held, whether we should leave the road and seek a lodging at the farm to the north, or proceed on the trail to L/angston's. The latter being resolved on, we pushed forward, and just after dark came to a stream, on which, so far as we could see, grew a large body of woods. Passing through this woods, it was quite dark, and after crossing the stream we lost the road again, and got into a small lake or swamp, and once out of that, into a flat, marshy bottom, where the grass was higher than our horses. Here Frank proposed that we should stop, and wait till the moon rose; but as that would not be till midnight, and as it had cleared up so that the stars could be seen, I insisted that we push on in a northwest course, and that we might strike the trail again or come in sight of the light in lyangston's house, which I said could not be very far off. And sure enough, in a short time a light was seen, and on approaching it, the outlines of a very small cabin, but no other sign of improvement. The man who came at our call, in answer to the question, where we were, said we were in Van Buren County, on the waters of Big Creek and close by the Shawnee Trace. In answer to the question, whether he could keep us and our horses over night, he replied, "I reckon not; we can hardly keep ourselves. We've only been here a week or two; have no stable, no corn, no meat, no coffee, no nothing; we are new begin- ners here in the world; but if you'll go down there and get in that trail, you'll find ahouse jeet beyant the branch, where I reckon you can stay." On our saying we were afraidof getting lost again, he said, " I'll go and put you on the road, and you can't miss the way.' Once in the Trace, you can't get out, without you kick out.'' He did so, and as we were parting Frank asked if the house across the branch was the lyangston place. "Yes," was the reply, and we were away. We soon crossed the branch, and came to a small field of two or three acres, at the farther side of which we came in view of another small cabin. As we approached it, Frank remarked, "If the old man A hoosisr's tramp 19 and his wife and his six-foot boys are all at home, I fear we'll have a crowded house to-night." In answer to our halloo, a boyish specimen of human- ity came out to the little gate, and when asked if he could keep us till morning, answered that if we were not par- ticular about our fare, he would try ; and in our circum- stances we thought it best not to be too particular. He assisted us in putting up our horses in a small stable, made of poles, and, throwing some fodder into the trough, he told us to go into the house, and he would bring some corn from the field for our horses. On our saying that we were as hungry as bears and would like to have supper, he said, "Go in and talk to the cook." Frank preferred to go and assist in feeding the horses, while I went in to order supper. On my entrance, I was , surprised to see nobody but a bashful-looking girl, fifteen or sixteen years old, who set me one of the three chairs in the cabin, and bade me be seated. I told her we would like to have supper, and while she was busy in making a fire in the wide, open fire-place, I took a hasty view of the surroundings. The room appeared to be about fifteen or sixteen feet square; the floor was of rough hewed puncheons, and overhead were half a dozen round pole joists, on which was laid a loft of clapboards. There were two doors, the shutters of which were also made of clapboards. Of furniture, a bed in the northeast corner and another in the southeast, placed on rough bedsteads, the posts and rails of which had been hewed and dressed with a drawing-knife. In one corner, next the fire-place, with its rough back and jambs, was the cupboard or dresser, made by laying some smooth clapboards on pegs driven into auger-holes in the wall. A similar piece of furniture, in the back end of the house, between the beds, served in place of a bureau, on which the bed-clothing and wearing apparel were packed away. A square table, three split-bottomed chairs, and what was neither lounge, sofa, settee, nor cradle, but a sort of compromise between them all — a thick, heav}^ board, or puncheon, dressed off and placed on rockers like those of a cradle, with another board fastened to uprights, against which the back could rest while sitting on the bench and rocking. There was 20 SURAL RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. also the large cotton wheel and cards, and other neces- sary articles of housekeeping. In the corner opposite the cupboard was the book- case, made as the cupboard was, by laying boards upon pegs in the wall. Having a curiosity to see what kind of books the cranky old man was in the habit of reading, after the girl had lighted an old-fashioned, greasy, cast- iron lamp and had stepped out for something, I ap- proached the book-stand, and on examination found some histories; the "Life of Washington and Marion," by Weems; the "Life of Jackson"; some books of travel; and amongst the rest, an old treatise on surveying. Having hastily come to the conclusion that the old folks were away from home, and that the younger children were keeping house in their absence, when the young woman returned, I ventured to remark: "Your father and mother are not at home, I suppose?' • With a mischievous smile, she replied: "They were a few days ago, and I reckon they are yet." "Then you don't live here?" "Yes, I stay here; but my parents live twenty miles off, oh the Sni, near Greenton." "Near Greenton, did you say? are you acquainted in that neighborhood?" "Yes ; I was raised there." "Do you know a man there by the name of Lester?" "No, I don't know him; I've heard of him though." At this moment we were interrupted by the entrance of Frank and the young man, who had been caring for the horses. Frank appeared as much surprised as I had been, on seeing nobody but me and the girl present; and we both took a hasty survey of the beardless boy who was acting as our host; spare built, with long legs and arms, and awkward and gawky-looking in the extreme. Frank at once came to the same conclusion that I had done — that the old folks were away; and asked the ^^oungster about the same questions that I had asked the girl — whether the old folks, his parents, were at home. He smiled, as the girl had done, and replied: "I spose they are; they very seldom leave home. But I know A HOOSIER S TRAMP. 21 what you mean, and must inform you that we are the old folks ourselves." "I beg pardon," said Frank, "but we were told that an old man lived here, Mr. Langston; is that not your name?" "Not quite that," said he; "the old man lyangston did live here; he setttled the place, but he has moved to the Platte, he and all his boj^s ; and as to asking pardon, there is no harm done; we are used to it; it's not the first time that we've been asked where our daddy and mamma was." "What is your age," said I, "and how long have you been here?" "lam twenty-two and she is sixteen; and we came here last April." "How long have you been in the State, and from what part did you-come?" "We are both from Tennessee, near the Cumberland Mountains ; I have been in the State three years, and she has been here nearly all her life." The young housewife here handed her husband a tin cup, with some parched coflfeee in it, and asked him to beat it. He stepped to the door and brought in his axe, which had an old-fashioned pudding-stick handle, sawed off square at the end, and seating himself on the rocking - bench, with the cup pressed between his feet on the floor, commenced beatingwith the end of the axehelve, and soon had the coffee pulverized. Meanwhile, the oven with its corn-dodgers and the skillet with its fried pork were before the fire, and supper was soon served, to which we did am- ple justice. I must own that we were disappointed; we had ex- pected to be entertained with the cranky actions, jokes, and tales of the old pioneer; but instead we were being taken care of by a boy and girl, who were quite reserved in their manners. Our questions were all answered with civility and simplicity ; but beyond this, the conversation was mostly on our part. We learned that his nearest neighbor (excepting the one across the branch, who had just moved there) was a mile and a half off; that our host had bought the little improvement of the old pioneer, and entered the land on which it was located; that he had kept "batch" awhile, making rails to fence a farm; "and then," said he, "I 22 RURAL RHYMES AND OLD^N TIMES. married and brought this girl here to cook for me." I here remarked to Frank that the lady had informed me that her parents lived near Greenton. "Near Greenton?" said Frank to the young man; "are you acquainted there?" "Not much," said he; only with a few families." "Do you know a man by the name of I^ester?" "I saw him once." "Then, tell me all you know about him?" "Of my own knowledge, I don't know anything. IVe heard a good deal. He bought my father-in-law's farm some time ago, and they are all living there until my father-in-law can build and move onto his place in this neighborhood." "What family has he?" said Frank, somewhat agitated. "Can't say certainly; I've heard my wife's mother speak of them. There's Lester himself, three women, and a boy; but she was somewhat in the dark as to the rela- tionship, and thought there was some mystery about them." ' ' Three women , you say. What are their ages ? Have you ever heard them described?" "Well, one of them, I suppose, is an old lady, as she passes for lycster's mother; another is a young woman and is called his wife; besides, there is another elderly woman, said to be a widow, with a son ten or twelve years old. But my mother-in-law doubts whether any of them are all they pretend to be; at any rate, she thinks there is some mystery about them." "And do you know anything about Lester's occupa- tion?" "Can't say; he bought the farm, as he said, for farm- ing purposes; but I suppose trade and speculation is his principal business. I have heard my wife's brother speak of his boasting of what sums he had made by his sharp tricks in trade." •'And you have never seen those women yourself?" "Yes; I was there a short time ago, and saw the two younger women pass through the yard. They were liv- ing in a cabin a few" paces from the one occupied by my father-in-law." "Can you describe the youngest one — Lester's wife?" A hoosier's tramp. 23 "Rather taller than common, spare-made; light hair, inclining to red." "That's her," said Frank to me ; "the villain ! the deep- dyed villain!" and he relapsed into silence. I then entered into conversation with the young man, relative to the country through which we were passing. He said we were near the northeast corner of the county of Van Buren ; "a county organized," said he, "only a year ago;" said the first general election was held in August, and that the county polled less than two hundred votes; that the seat of justice was not yet located; that the courts had been held at private houses, on the South Grand River, some eighteen or twenty miles to the southwest; that there was but one store of goods in all the county, and that it was about six miles west of him; that there was but one post-office, and that it had just been estab- lished, and was twenty miles away. I asked what the pros- pect was for entering Government lands in the county. He replied that there were but eighteen sections, or half a township, yet in market ; that the balance was condemned land. Wishing to know what was meant by condemned lands, he said it had been returned by commissioners or surveyors as not worth surveying, on account of the scarcity of timber. The eighteen sections then in market, he said, were in the northeast corner of the county; that only a small part of that was entered yet ; that there were but five or six families living in that half township; but that more would be very soon. On my asking how the condemned land was taken up and held, he said : "Each settler marks out his claim, which, if not unreasonably large, is respected l^y everybody else, and no one tres- passes upon another; and they run their lines to suit their own convenience-" "Then," said I, "you have no use for a county surveyor, and perhaps have none." "Very little use indeed," said he; "I was elected as such last August, but it is an office of no profit and very little work to do." "I see," said I, "that you have Gibson's Surveying; at what school did you study it?" "At no school at all; haven't been at school since I was fourteen years old, and not much before ; but I learned 24 RURAI, RHYxMES AND OIvDEN TIMES. surveying like I learned other things, by hard study at home." The young housekeeper, having cleared up things, invited us to occupy one of the two beds in the cabin, and I slept soundly till daylight. On waking up, Frank said: " I'll tell j^ou what, Jim, I've been dreaming all night about Lester and his rascal- ities; and mark what I tell yoU now, he'll get his deserv- ings some day. I dreamed it over and over, the same thing again and again, and I tell you now, and mind you remember it, he'll end his days upon the gallows." " I'm going back by there," said he, "and I'll find out more about him before I leave the State; and as I said, he'll hear from me some day.'" I tried to dissuade him from his purpose, saying that he could not punish him by law for what he had done; and that if he resorted to violence, he would make mat- ters worse, and get himself and friends into trouble. We paid our bill, more than was asked, and set out again on the old trail. About three or four miles further on, in going round a farm that had been fenced across the trail, we took the wrong road again — the one that led to the store which our host had spoken of, and which, as I remember, was kept by a Mr. Wright, who was selling goods, groceries, medicines, and a little of everything needed in new countries. The store was located on a high ridge of prairie, from which was an extensive view in all directions, with a farm and farm- house in sight here and there, but the greater part of the country in its native wildness. I afterward saw in Wetmore's Gazetteer of Missouri, written in 1836, a mention of this store and the surrounding country, which I can vouch for as being true at that time. Before reaching the store, we were informed, by a man that we met in the path, that we were at least a mile south of the Shawnee Trace ; and on leafning that we were wishing to go to the Platte Purchase, he exclaimed, "Well, old Uncle Jimmy Savage is at the store, now on his way there, and if you'll hurry up, he can pilot j^ou right thar." "But who," I asked, "is old Uncle Jimmy Savage?" "Oh!" said he, " everybody knows him, and he knows everybody. But if you wish to catch him, you had better A hoosier's tramp. 25 hurry up ; he jest come to the store to get a new hat, and he's goin' straight to Independence, and then on to the Purchase." We trotted on to the store, hitched our horses, and went in. I asked the keeper of the store if Mr. Savage had been there, as I saw no person present that filled the description of an old uncle. " Yes," said he ; " been gone onl}'- a few minutes." Frank then spoke to the merchant in an undertone, informing him of our destination, and asked whether he thought Mr. Sa\age a proper traveling companion. " Yes," said the merchant ; "there's no harm in old Jimmy, and you'll find him an entertaining companion." We waited for no more, and on reaching our horses, met a youth just alighting, and asked if he had seen any- thing of old Mr. Savage. " Yaas," said the boy, looking up the road. "Do you see that man way ofFyander, on that big roan marr?" "Yes." "Well, that's him." We whipped up, and in less than an hour had come up wiih him. A plain farmer-looking man, of perhaps sixty years ; dressed in homespun from head to foot, with a new wool hat, sure enough. After the first words of salutation, I asked if he lived in the vicinity. "Yes," said he; "across the creek yander (pointing east), a little piece this side o' the Jack." "And may I ask," said I, "what you call the Jack?" "Oh! the Lone Jack, to be sure." "Excuse me, sir, but we are strangers here, and don't know any place of that name." "Well," said he, "look across over yander ; do you see that lone tree, standing on the high prairie? " "Yes ; I see something of that sort." "Well, that's Lone Jack." "And why do you call it Jack, rather than Jim or Tom?" "Just because the tree is a black Jack tree, and not a black Jim. It's been called the lyone Jack ever since I know'd it, and that's been a good long while, I tell you; ♦before there was any roads in the country, or trails through the grass; it was our pilot, or landmark, when 26 RURAI. RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. we was out here bee huutin' and deer huiititi' and huntin' elk, which we was mity near every fall." "Then you are an old settler in this country?" "Old settler! I reckon I am, if twenty-five years counts anything. I was in the State ten years before it was a State; settled in Cooper County, amongst the Injins, before the war of 1 8 1 2 ; and was one amongst the fifteen families that forted through the war, in Cole's and Kin- kaid's forts, to save our scalps." "No doubt, then, you know and could tell something about the dangers and hardships of frontier life?" "Frontier life ! I don't know anything else. I've been on the frontier for twenty-five or thirty years; and am on my way now to the Platte Purchase, to hunt me a home at the jumping-oflF place again." "Ah ! is that so? We are on our way to look at that countrj^ and would be pleased to have a frontiersman to be our companion and pilot." "At your service, gentlemen. I know almost every hog-path between here and the Missouri River, and a good many on the other side, too ; and besides, I have several friends and acquaintances lately moved to the Purchase ; so you'll find me at home wherever I go." Frank now spoke up for the first time, saying, "Are you much acquainted in Lafayette County?" "Oh, yes; I know most all the settlers there; espe- cially in the western part." "Are 3^ou acquainted near Greenton?" "Mighty well, with the old settlers there. The Helmses, the Jameses, the Hoppers, the Whites, the Hughes, the Manions, the Barkers, McClure, and Sloane, Jennings, Cammel, and a good many others." "Do you know any one by the name of Lester?" "No; I reckon he's a new-comer. I don't know many of them." "Do you knov/ the young couple, and what kind 01 people they are, where we staid last night ; down on the Shawnee trail where Mr. Langston once lived?" "Mighty well. That youngster kep' our school a year or two ago ; and I've known his wife ever since she was a child. He's a perfect swinge cat, worse than he looks ; that is, he knows more than you think he does. Hi^ A HOOSIER'S tramp. 27 wife's mother is a mighty fine woman, and I reckon she is a first-rate gal. She don't know much about readin' and writin', but she knows how to spin and weave, and milk the cows, and I reckon that boy and gal will make a livin'." I remarked that what my friend wanted to know, principally, was whether they were truthful, as they had given him some information in which he was deeply interested. "I have never heard anything else of them," said he; "and if they told you anything that ain't so, I don't think they intended it." Frank appeared satisfied with the answers, and asked where we could cross the river, and how far it was to it. "We can cross," said he, "at Ducker's Ferry, or at Westport lyanding. I am not certain which way I shall go, but I think by Westport. I shall stay in the neigh- borhood of Independence to-night, which is twenty miles from here; and Westport is ten miles west of it." "It looks," said I, "as if we had a good stretch of prairie ahead of us." "Yes; and we will pass no house till we reach the Blue timber, a good ten miles yet." I asked if the road we were on was the old Shawnee trail. "No," said he; "we passed that some distance back, and this is the Harmony Mission road, leading to the Mission or Injin School on the Osage or Merrydezeen." We found the old gentleman a genial, friendly, com- municative backwoodsman, with a frank, open counte- nance — open in more ways than one ; for there was an opening in front of his face that reminded one of a poor man's rent — from year to year (without the j). Jle interested us with his tales of the early settlement of the country and of frontier life, when the boys went courting in their deer-skin dressing, and the girls sometimes wore dresses of the same material. He told us, too, of the dangers, privations, and hard- ships of the fifteen families living in the count^^ of Cooper, during the War of 18 12, some of his tales being amusing and some otherwise. One particular incident he recounted, of his own nar- 28 RURAI, RHYME;S AND OI.DKN TIMKS. row escape from the Indians, when he and a fellow-hunter named Smith were surprised when outside the fort hunt- ing for something to support life inside. "We were some distance from the fort," said he, "and had killed a fine doe, and was fixing to swing her on a pole to carry to the fort, when our dog gave a fearful growl and his hair all turned up the wrong way. Smith said: ' L,ook out, Jim ! ' and I did look out, and saw some- thing I didn't want to see. Across the holler, over on the next ridge, we saw about a dozen redskins, who had already seen us, and was stealing along through the weeds and bushes right toward us. We dropped our venison and picked up our guns, and you may bet we made moc- casin tracks fast. I was younger then than I am now, and had run many a foot-race, but I made better time then than I ever made before. Smith soon dropped his gun, and we run side and side. The fort was nearly north, and the Injins was toward the west. A part of them came like all fury right toward us, and a part attempted to head us off by striking straight for the fort. They were soon near enough to commence shooting. I gave a few jumps more, then turned and fired at them, and, dropping my old flint-lock, I ran for dear life, giving a yell every few moments to let our folks at the fort know what was up. A hundred yards further, and Smith fell by my side, his blood spurting onto my huntin'-shirt. Another moment or two and my calls for help were answered from the fort. A gun was fired, and I had the pleasure to see the Injins stop. But you may be sure I didn't stop, nor did they stop shooting as long as I was in reach." After he had recounted many of his adventures and trials, I asked how long he had been in his present location. "I moved to where I live now two years ago last March, but I have been in Jackson County since 1826, before it was organized as a county, when Independence was a corn-patch, and deer and turkeys was plenty, and the nettles growed as high as my head in places. I built a cabin on the I^ittle Blue, up here, and after opening a a little corn-field and beatin' meal and hominy for a year or two, I built a little water-mill for the accommodation of A hoosier's tramp. 29 the settlers, and remained there till the winter of 1833, when I sold it and moved down by the Lone Jack, and am living now in the first house that was ever built in that part of the county — built by a man named Dunna- way — one who, like me, has always been trying to be at the outside. I hear he is settling or building now at the head of Bear Creek, down on the Shawnee Trace. Did you see anything of him as you come up ? " I told him that we had seen no one after leaving Mor- ris's, but that we had passed a set of house-logs at the head of the creek. "Well," said he, "that's Isaac Dunnaway, and I reckon he'll keep a-going." " Have the Indians ever given you any trouble here ? " I asked. "No," said he, "we have never had any to speak of. Our old women would sometimes take a skeer, and some of the old-womanish men would run and hide. But we never had any war trouble that amounted to much, till the Mormons come here and kicked up a dust, and we had to drive 'em off. But may be you don't know any- thing about Mormons? " I assured him that we did not. "Then you needn't want to know anything about 'em," said he, and I thought he was not going to tell me anything. After a few moments I asked, "What kind of people are they? " not exactly knowing whether they were peo- ple or some other kind of "varmint." "Oh," said he, " they claimed to be some kind of a religious sex, and said they had received a revelation from heaven, which the angel Gabriel, or some other angel, brought down on plates of gold to their prophet, Joe Smith ; that it had been revealed to 'em that they were to build a Zion, or New Jerusalem, on the spot where Independence now is ; and that the whole county of Jackson had been given to the Saints (as they called themselves) for an inheritance, and that the Gentiles was to be driven out and dispossessed." "And did they have their preachers, and what kind 01 doctrine did they preach? " "Yes, they had their preachers, or elders, as they 30 RURAL RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. called 'em; and their preachin', I reckon, was like every- body else's — better than their practice. They put up a printing office at Independence, and printed a newspaper filled with nonsensical prophecies and revelations made by the Almighty to His servants, Joseph, and Sydney, and Oliver, and Parley, and layman, and Ziba, and I can't tell you how many more ; their preacher pretending to speak in unknown tongues, heal the sick, and work miracles, and, so far as I could see, it was all an unknown jargon of foolishness." "And did they attempt to dispossess the other citizens, or the Gentiles?" " Yes, in a certain way; you see, a few of them located near Mr. A, and by their petty thieving, their trespasses and insulting ways, would so annoy him that to escape their deviltries he would sell out to them for a mere song ; and then half a dozen more of them, located on his place, would so annoy Mr. B, adjoining, that he too would sell out to escape them ; and so on, first one and then another, until it seemed that the whole possy would be bought out, from A to Izzard. So we got together, and said it had to be stopped ; and if any more dispossessing had to be done, it would be the other way, " They had a strong settlement at Independence, one at Westport, and scattered members all over the county. "About the last of September, three years ago, some of the heathen Gentiles about Independence got together, pulled down the printing office, tarred and feathered their Elder Partridge, and whistled ' Bob White ' at him, and ordered the whole lot of Latter-day Saints to get away. They went to Westport, where, a few weeks after, the Gentiles and the Mormons had a little brush of a fight. The Mormons also came in force to attack Independ- ence, but were met by a force so large that they didn't do it; and after some palavering, they agreed to leave the county ; and they did leave and went across the river into Clay." "And that," said I, "was the last of them, I suppose? " "Not the last, by any means," was his repl)^ "The next spring some of their head men from New York and Ohio came on with large reinforcements, and they resolved to come back and wipe us all out. A hoosier's tramp. 31 "That was the biggest scare and excitement we ever had. The whole county was in arms, with a part of Lafayette to help us. A company of fifty or more, from our part of the county and Van Buren, which then was a part of Jackson, elected me their captain, and we made a forced march to Independence in the night. The night, you remember, that the moon was eclipsed, two 3^ears ago last June. Well, we got there, but the Mormons hadn't come yet; and when they found out we was too strong for 'em, they gave it up, and entered into some sort of treaty to disband their army and let us alone." "And where are they now?" asked Prank. "Up on north Grand River. They stayed a year or more in Clay, till the people there got tired of them, and drove 'em as we did; and they went to Daviess and Cald- well counties and are there yet, and still increasing in numbers; and I guess the trouble is not over yet." We had left the Mission road, and were pursuing our way on a small bridle-path, or trail, through the grass, and after awhile came to the timbered lands of the lyittle Blue; and as we proceeded the country became more rough and uneven, with here and there a cabin and small corn-field, and as we passed, our companion would now and then point out spots where he had killed elk or deer, or cut bee-trees, and recount the circumstances. On reaching the Blue, we found a small grist-mill and a small and narrow corn-field, which our companion told us he had formerly owned, and sold it to its then owner, a Mr. Hawkins. He pointed out the spot where his first cabin stood, and where his nearest neighbor then resided. Having some business at the mill, he stopped there ; directing us where we could find a blacksmith, to put a shoe on each one of our horses, we parted company, agreeing to meet the next morning at the store of Gen- eral Owens, in Independence. After some trouble, we found the shop and the smith, who was also an old ' pioneerQohnson, I think, by name) ; a smith who manu- factured his own coal, having a large charcoal pit burning at the time. On being asked if he knew old Jimmy Savage, he replied, "Oh! certainly; everybody knows him. He's 32 RURAL RHYMES AND OlyDEN TIMKS. the first preacher that ever preached in these diggins ; or if not the first, near about it." " Well," said Frank, "that beats me. I knew he was farmer, miller, hunter, and soldier, but didn't dream that he was a preacher." Having to make our horseshoes from a heavy bar of iron, and also to make the nails to put them on with, the sun was quite low before we left the shop. The smith said if we did not wish to go on to town, we could stay at Stayton's or at Shepherd's. We stopped at Stayton's about sunset, and were told that it was two miles to town, and that we could stay. He appeared to be a well-to-do farmer; had a good farm in a beautiful location ; a large family, mostly boys. We had supper soon, and our host informed us that there was to be preaching at the meeting-house, and that he hoped we would excuse him, as he wished to be in attendance. Frank, who was a church-going man, proposed that if it was not too far, we would attend also. On being told that it was but a short mile, and that the family would walk, we all set out together. We had been told that it was a Baptist meeting, and that Parson White, of Lafayette County, was expected to preach. I suppose that this fact was one reason why Frank wished to be in attendance. He was, however, disappointed. Elder White was not present. The pastor of the church, Fitzhugh, I think, opened the services ; and while singing the open- ing hymn, we were surprised to see our traveling com- panion enter, and, on a signal from the preacher, walk up into the stand. After the hymn and prayer, and a whispered consultation of half a minute, the tall preacher announced his text : "By grace are ye saved." I soon found that he was not only a Baptist, but one of the kind called " hard-shell," or extreme Calvinistic. He appeared to be a man of some intelligence and well read, but somewhat eccentric in his manners and arguments, bringing smiles to the face oftener than tears to the eyes. At the close of the sermon old Uncle Jimmy rose slowly, and, after singing "Am I a Soldier of the Cross? " opened his discourse about as follows : " My dear brethren, friends and old neighbors, as our A hoosier's tramp. 33 good brother down at Salem would say, my tex' is found at verse 8, IV chapter of the one I John : ' God is love.' So well convinced was the Apossel John of this fact that he said it not only once, but twice or ofF'ner. You'll find it at verse 8, and again at verse i6 ; and, my friends, I believe he meant just what he said — that God, the great God of heaven and earth, is love, first, and last, and all the time ; that He is love from the beginning to the end ; not a part love and a part hate, but love all the time ; and, being love, and loving the whole of the lost race of Adam, He gave His only Son, the Lord Jesus, to die for them, for me and for you, and for all, ' That whosoever believeth in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life.' Brethren, this is all the doctrine I have to preach on this tex'. You know that Old Jimmy is called the exhortin' preacher. Then let me to-night exhort you, as though it were the last night of my life and yours, if you have not already believed in Him and come to Him, to make a start now. Let me plead with you, as one who loves you well, to ground the arms of your rebel- lion against One who loves you much better, and died that you might live." For twenty minutes then he continued to exhort the unbelieving part of the audience, in language that drew tears from his own as well as other eyes ; completely, as I thought, upsetting the predestinarian doctrines of his brother and predecessor. After we returned from church, I asked our host who Uncle Jimmy meant by the good brother at Salem ? "Well," said he, " I suppose it is Brother Joab Powell, a good and worthy preacher, but one that is quite illit- erate — scarcely able to read intelligibly — and who is reported to have taken his text or quoted something from the 'two chapter of one I John' ; a made tale, no doubt," said he. Our host told us that his father and a younger brother were also Baptist preachers, and that this denom- ination was the prevailing one in the county. The next morning, at the store agreed upon, we met our traveling companion of the day before. We found Independence to be the most beautiful town and the largest we had seen since leaving St. Louis. 34 RU'RAI, RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. In addition to the store of Samuel C. Owens, who afterwards fell at the battle of Sacramento, in the Mexi- can War, there were several others, which our friend Savage told us were doing a good business. There was also a variety of tradesmen, such as smiths, saddlers, tailors, wagon-makers, hatters, etc. Leaving Independ- ence for Westport, we crossed over what our pilot told us was the Temple Lot, on which the Mormons were to build the Mount Zion of the latter days. And as we stood upon that elevated and beautiful site, surrounded by the beautiful and fertile country on all sides, we could not do otherwise than commend the good taste of the revelator, whoever he was, that revealed this as the chosen site of the New Jerusalem. A ride of three hours brought us to Westport, on the western boundary of the State, the State line, as we were told, being less than a mile west of the town. It was the outside verge of civilization, or the white man's resi- dence. Beyond the State line, we were told, the Shaw- nee, the Delaware, and the Wyandotte Indians had their homes or reservations. Dozens of them were in the streets and stores that morning, in their grotesque habil- iments, some comparatively well dressed, and some almost naked. The Santa Fe and mountain traders were also arriving from the western plains, with their long teams of oxen and mules. Indians, Mexicans, and Mis- sourians were mixed and mingled together in the one street of that small western frontier town. But as we were in haste to cross the river into the lately purchased territory — the promised land to many an expectant emi- grant — we stayed not long to make inquiries about the trade or business of this bustling village, but left it with the impression that in the future it might eclipse, in size and business, many a larger town. Our pilot having transacted his business, we set oft in a northern direction for the river, or, as it was called, the landing. A wagon-road had been made with great labor, leading from the steamboat-landing up into the town, a distance of three or four miles. A few cabins and corn patches were seen and passed, but we were told that the larger part of the land was held by specu- lators and large land-holders of Westport and vicinity. A hoosier's tramp. 35 We found the landing under a steep bluff, which extended for some distance up and down the river ; the roughest and hilliest landscape we had seen since leav- ing Springfield. The hills, steep and rugged, appeared to be thrown together in confusion, separated only by deep and almost impassable gorges, extending from the mouth of the Kaw for miles down the river ; and no thought entered our minds that this was to be the site of the future great metropolis — Kansas City. Having crossed the river, we found quite a different country; instead of rough hills and gorges, as on the south side, we found a level bottom, extending for miles up and down the river, and far out to the north. Taking the road leading north, through the western part of Clay County, we came to the small town of Barry, and then turning west, were soon passing the lately built cabins and the newly cleared lands of the Platte Purchase. Every mile, two or three cabins were seen and passed, which indicated that if the country was not already settled, it soon would be. It was night when we arrived at the house of the friend for whom Uncle Jimmy had been inquiring. I^ike all the others, it was a newly settled place on a stream called Bee Creek. There was no barn or stable, but we were provided with halters, and our horses, as well as ourselves, were made welcome and comfortable. The conversation was almost wholly carried on by Uncle Jimmy and his old friend and family, which Frank and I enjoyed almost as much as they, as there were a good many interesting stories and reminiscences of the old times to talk over, and many hearty laughs were indulged in at the recital of those stories of the past. Amongst other things, I remember the conversation turned upon ghosts and ghost stories. Uncle Jimmy said the most of these stories were all fiction. "But," said he. " I remember one in which I acted a part that had no fiction in it. • It was when I was a 5'oung man, in ray courting days, that me and three other mischiev- ous youngsters happened at the Widow B's on a winter evening, all bent upon a courtship. There was four boys of us and only three gals ; and it so turned out that 36 RURAL RHYMES AND OLDKN TIMES. I was the one that was left — that is, left without a part- ner. I staid, though, till near bedtime, talking to Bob, the big brother, and playing pranks and jokes on the other boys and gals, and at last picked up my hat to go home. One of the gals (my gal, by the bye) said that if I started I'd get scared in going by the graveyard and come back on the run. "Her partner — the chap that had cut me out — said he'd bet a ninepence that I wouldn't dare to go by the meetin'-house at all, but that if I did go home I'd go some round-about way, so as to miss the ghosts. " These insinuations got my dander up, and I told the gal that she wouldn't see me running back there in a hurry; and I told Jack I'd take his bet, and to prove that I went the direct road, I'd go into the meetin'-house and write the first letter of my name on the pulpit. 'Done!' said Jack, 'and I tell you now, Jim, that big "J" won't get on the pulpit to-night.' The other gals laughed, and the other boys said they'd like to go a ninepence too. But I told 'em I didn't want their money, but I did want to show 'em I wasn't a coward, and that the winning of one ninepence would be as convincing as if I had won a hundred; and picking up a piece of charcoal from the hearth, I put on my hat and started. The snow was on the ground full six inches deep — soft and light — and I hurried on, too mad, as I thought, to be skeered at ghosts or anything else. It was but a short distance to the meetin'- house, an old log building, whose one door usually stood open, at least it was never locked, and I knowed I would have no trouble in getting in to make my mark. I passed the gravej^ard pretty brave; my hair did rise up a little, but I kept my hat on and pressed it down, keeping on till near the door of the meetin'-house, when I stopped short. A deep, hollow groaning seemed to come from the house, as if some one breathing in the last agonies of death. Pit-a-pat, pit-a-pat, went my heart, and I felt as if my feet would like to beat the same music in the snow. Two or three times I turned round to leave the house and hurry home, and as often turned back to hear the same fearful groaning, deep and death-like. "All at once it occurred to me that Bob had left the room just before I started, as he said, to go to bed ; and A hoosikr's tramp. 37 made up my mind that it was a put-up job to get a big joke upou me, and that Bob was in the house, making all that fearful noise. I was mad enough before; the cut- ting-out had put me in bad humor. The insinuations of my want of courage had raised my dander still higher, and now I was awful mad. The moon was near setting and gave but little light; but I managed to find a stick or club to my notion, and screwing up my courage to the upper notch, I marched up to the door — up on the steps. The door was open; I listened; the groaning seemed to come from under the pulpit, right where I was to make the big 'J.' I thought the death-groans too natural to be imitated b}^ Bob or anybody else; but I made up my mind to give Bob, or the ghost, or whoever it was, a taste of my club ; and drawing back, I let fly with all my might. Before I could think, a large figure in white was coming right toward me. It looked, as I thought, a hobgoblin in size and in deed, and in an instant, before I could move or think of moving, I felt myself lifted off the steps and being carried through the air some distance, and then thrown to the ground." "L,aw! law!" said one of the girls present; "whatdid you do?" "Well," said he, "I didn't faint; I didn't scream; I didn't jump up and run ; but I got up and laughed. And what do you think it was? Nothing but an overgrown white sow that had gone into the house to sleep in the dry, and when her slumbering and snoring was disturbed by the whack of my stick, had run with all speed, and coming between my legs, lifted and carried me into the yard and then dropped me and run off, while the grunt- ing and squealing of the shotes told the tale. "Well, as I said, I got up, and after getting over my laugh, I brushed off the snow, felt in my jacket pocket for my fire-coal; went in and up to the hog-bed by the pulpit, and made my mark, which the boys were curious enough to come and look for next morning; and Jack was man enough to pay the ninepence, but I was not man enough to tell all the story that I've told to-night." We parted company next morning with the old fron- tier preacher and his kind friends, and made our explora- tions through the Platte country alone. It is not my pur- 38 RURAL RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. pose to State what we saw or did further, save only to say that Frank selected a home in what is now Buchanan County, to which he afterward moved ; and that I returned to spend my days amongst the Hoosiers on the White River. On our return we stopped and tarried all night near Greenton. Frank could learn nothing further about Lester than we had heard on our way up. All that had been told us, however, was confirmed. We were told that the man whom he had bought out, and with whom for a time he lived, had moved off, and no one else seemed to know much about his domestic affairs. Frank was persuaded to proceed on without seeing his cousin or provoking a quarrel with her seducer. He informed me, though, that he had made arrangements with a young man, that he thought he could depend upon, to watch Lester's movements, find out all he could, and keep him (Frank) posted. Yeqrs passed. Frank was in Buchanan. I had be- come a man of family, and many of the incidents of my journey to Missouri had faded from my memory. I re- ceived letters from Frank, at long intervals apart. In one he told me he had managed to correspond with his cousin, and also with her friends in Virginia, and that she had abandoned Lester and returned to her relations. A few years later, another letter closed with these words : "You remember J. C. Lester; he has met his deserts, as I told you he would ; my dream has been realized. He was hung last week, at Clinton in Henry County, not many miles from where we met him on the open prairie. A history of all his crimes, and their incidents, would fill a volume." A short time after, as I was returning home from our country town, I fell in with a traveler, who said he was from Lafayette County, in Missouri. I asked immediately if he ever knew John C. Lester. "Yes," said he, "I knew him for years." "And is it true that he was hung recently?" "Yes, very true; and if anybody ever deserved hang- ing, I suppose he did." "For murder, I suppose?" said I. "Yes, sir; we never hang for anything else, and not often enough for that." A hooker's tramp. 39 On ni}^ remarking that I would like to hear the par- ticulars, as a friend had said they would fill a volume, he said: "Yes, sir, a good large one; and it would be a long story to give even a sketch of his career in crime." . "Well," said I, " I feel an interest in that story; I knew him when I was a boy, and I know something of his early tricks; saw him once in Missouri, and heard some- thing of his doings there; and if you'll stop over night with me, and give what you know of his history, I will make j'-ou a welcome guest as long as you please to stay, and will be very much your debtor beside." It being near night, he consented, and during the even- ing gave me the desired history, the substance of which I give, as nearly as I can, in his own words: "I was never intimately acquainted with Lester — I lived in the western part of the county ; saw him occa- sionally, and heard him spoken of as a scheming, specu- lating trickster. He first bought out an old settler by the name of Lynch; a good farm of eighty acres, for $600. He soon sold that, at a large profit, and partly bought and partly swindled a Mr. Hughes out of one of the best farms in the Greenton valley, and settled himself upon it. About this time, it is said, a young man from Vir- ginia, by the name of Horton, was employed by a friend or relation of Lester's wife, or rather the woman that he lived with, to assist him in unearthing some of Lester's dark deeds, and to secure the return of the woman to her friends. He succeeded in this, it was said; but because his employer could not or would not pay him all he demanded for his services and the secrets he had pos- sessed himself of, he sold himself to Lester, who, find- ing that Horton knew so much that he was completely in his power, gave him large sums of money and took him into partnership, and together they practiced their deeds of villainy. Being rid of the woman that he brought there with him, amongst other money-making schemes, he concluded to marry the daughter of a wealthy widow owning a large farm, several slaves, and other prop- erty, witk but two children, a son and daughter. For this purpose, or for some other, he professed religion and joined the Baptist Church, and for some time was a prom- inent member of that dQ,nomination." 40 RURAI, RHYMES AND OI,DEN TIMES. I here asked him what became of his mother and the widow that he carried to Missouri with him. " I believe," said the gentleman, "that his mother died a few years after coming there, and after he married the Widow Sc^^tt's daughter — or perhaps before, the other woman left him. Lester, however, kept her son as a kind of servant, claiming that the boy had been bound to him by his mother as an apprentice. This the mother and boy both denied, and after a time she brought suit for the boy and his wages. On the trial, Lester produced the articles of apprenticeship, and the man Horton, whose name was signed as a witness, swore to them as genuine, and the widow lost her suit. The community, however, were not satisfied, and the friends of the widow and of justice went to work, and at the next term of court Les- ter and Horton were both indicted; one for forgery and the other for perjury. " The trials were put off from time to time, and in the interval other strange occurrences took place. The wealthy widow whose daughter Lester had married held her farm and negroes during life, and was not disposed to divide with her children as they desired ; and on a win- ter's evening, when the negroes were all off at a corn- husking, the widow was burned to death in her house, where she had been left alone. "Circumstances pointed to the fact and the neighbors believed that she was put into the fire by Lester, but as there was no proof of it, he was never arrested for it. The widow being being out of the way, the property of course descended to the son and daughter. King Scott, the son, a reckless spendthrift, who was thought to be hand in glove with Lester in his rascalities, was after a time arrested for theft. The officer having him in charge permitted him to go to bed at night in an upper room, and, after hiding his prisoner's clothes, went to bed and to sleep himself, below stairs. In the ni'ght Scott got up, came down, and, stealing the officer's clothes, decamped and made good his escape. Rewards were offered, and a diligent search was made, but all in vain. Nobody had seen him, and he never was seen again alive by any of the neighbors. In a short time Horton was tried for per- jury and sent to the penitentiary (I believe for five years). A hoosiek's tramp. 41 "Months passed and I^ester was in possession of the Scott farm, and no tidings or clue to the whereabouts of the missing brother. Circuit court came on again, and I^ester was tried for forgery and acquitted, owing, it was thought, to the influence that money has in our courts of justice. The friends of Horton then got up a petition to the governor, for his pardon and release, on the ground that if lycster was not guilty, Horton was not. In other words, if the articles of apprenticeship were not forged, but genuine, then Horton had sworn truly. On this peti- tion he was pardoned, and returned home. Lester had not manifested much- desire to get him released, but he manifested great anxiety to be the first to see him after he returned. But others were before him, and the silence or the secret which he wished to secure was imparted to others, and astonished all who heard it. He said King Scott was no longer living; that he had been murdered; that he saw him killed; that he saw him buried; and that Lester was the murderer, and that he could now point out the spot where he was buried. A warrant was at once issued for the arrest of Lester, and the sheriff with a posse of men set out to make the arrest, and the guilty culprit was taken in charge. On the way to Lexington (the county seat), as their horses were drinking at the Little Sni, Lester suddenly wheeled his horse and fled. He was mounted on a strong and swift horse, but the sheriff was equally well mounted, and after a race of six hundred yards, came near enough to fire a pistol-shot, which took effect, disabling one of Lester's arms; but he still whipped with the other. The sheriff at length rode up by his side and ordered him to stop or be shot. He replied: 'I can't hold him.' 'Then quit whipping, you rascal.' The horse was at length stopped, and Lester fell off, apparently dying. His captors, however, thought there was more of 'possum' than death, and hurried him on to prison. In the meantime, Horton, with an officer and a squad of men, was dispatched to dig up the bones of the murdered man. Some thought he too was 'pos- summing,' or trying to make believe. One of the men present afterwards told me that when the spot was pointed out and he commenced digging in the bottom ol a small ravine in which the water was then flowing, he 42 RURAI, RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. did. SO with the firm conviction that nothing would be found. " 'There was nothing,' said he, 'to indicate that the spot had ever been visited by the foot of man since the world began. As they dug,' he said, 'Horton sat on the bank, looking as confident and unconcerned as if he had been overseeing a parcel of boys digging potatoes.' "That nothing was found as they proceeded, that indicated that the earth had ever been disturbed, until the body was reached. The bones were lifted out, but the head was wanting, as Horton had said it would be. The shiit, drawers, and vest were entirety rotten ; but the stolen pants in which he had escaped from the ofiicer were in such a state of preservation as to hold together while lifting the body from the pit. The pantaloons and the watch in the pocket were recognized as those belong- ing to the officer, and no doubt remained that these were the bones of King Scott. The conviction, however, was strong in the minds of all, that if lycster was guilty, Hor- ton was accessory and equally guilty, and he too was taken into custody, and both were indicted for the mur- der, lycster's trial came on first. Horton was the prin- cipal witness against him ; but there were other circum- stantials that strengthened his testimony." "But," said I to the stranger, "how did Horton ac- count for seeing so much of the murder and burial with- out implicating himself as taking part in it?" "As well as I remember, his story was that he was passing through the woods hunting, a few days after Scott made his escape, when he saw Scott and I^ester walking along together, when something that he saw or heard induced him to secrete himself and watch their movements. 'l/cster,' he said, 'had carried provisions or something to Scott to aid his escape, and as Scott stooped to pick up something, Lester struck him a heavy blow on the back of the head, and, following up his blows, soon deprived him of life.' That Lester walked a short distance, and returned with a spade, and buried him near by where he was killed. He also went on to say that some days after, as he was hunting again in the same woods, he went to the spot and found that the body had been taken up or rooted up by the hogs, and A hoosier's tramp. 43 was lying there with the head gone and nowhere to be seen; said that some hours after, as he was returning home, near the spot, he saw Lester carrying the bod}' toward the branch or ravine ; that he hid himself again, and watched him until the body was buried in the run- ning stream; and that after Lester retired, he went to the spot and marked the locality, so that he would be able to point it out. "By change of venue and other dilatory pleas, Les- ter's trial was kept off for a year or two; and the State would not bring Horton to trial, as his evidence was wanted against Lester. At last the trial came off, at Clinton, in Henry County, and he was found guilty, and hung only a month or two ago." "And where," I asked, "is Horton?" "He is there yet, awaiting his trial. People gener- ally think he was in the murder ; but as there is nothing but circumstantial evidence against him, he will probably be acquitted." "Yes," said I, "if he has money enough to fee the lawyers." "Well," said the stranger, "he hasn't got it, but his father-in-law has. You see, while he and Lester were engaged in their mischief, he married the daughter of a wealthy farmer and slave-holder, near Lexington, much against the old man's will, and he disowned them both, and permitted Horton to go to the penitentiary, without raising a finger to help him. But after he was pardoned out he took him under his protection and has stood by him ever since." So ended the story of the stranger, and a few months later I heard that Horton had been tried and acquitted, and to escape the execrations of the community, or the vengeance of "Judge Lynch," had left the county. CHAPTER II. The years came and went; peace and war succeeded each other and came in turn ; friends and acquaintances that I had once known were dropping off; my old friend, Frank Elmwood, was reposing, as I heard, in the came- 44 RURAL RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. tery at St. Joseph; the War of the Rebellion had been over for years ; the sons of many a northern and western father had found graves in the South ; one of my own was buried, I was told, where he fell, near the lone tree, the black-jack that the old Baptist preacher had pointed out to me on the high prairie, the summit land between the waters of the Missouri and the Osage. My own health had failed, and I was preparing to leave the home where I had so long dwelt, in hope of finding in travel that which medical treatment had failed to give, with the intention, also, of visiting that soldier's grave beneath the lone tree on the high prairie, and to see and revisit the country I had passed over with my friend in the days of our youthful manhood. My preparations were soon made — a gentle and strong horse, a light carriage, with a grandson of fourteen to drive and take care of me, I set out, proceeding, as before, to Vincennes, and thence to St. L/Ouis. My journey through the State of Illinois prepared me in some degree for the changes I was to witness still further on. The then large and unsettled prairies were all now in cultivation; the little villages had grown to be large and populous towns, and railroads were almost as numerous now as wagon-roads were then; St. Ivouis, which we then saw as a good large town, stretching up and down the river some distance above and below Wiggins' ferry, was now grown to be a city of such dimensions as not to be taken in at a single view, nor even by several views; but as I gave only the inci- dents of a three-days .trip then, I will go over only the same ground in my description now. Not having any business at Springfield, we proceeded leisurely along to Warsaw, on the Osage. It was a new and very small village then ; it is not a very large town even now, and has not as many marks of improvement as some other towns that have outstripped it. From thence to Clinton, which in 1836 had just been selected as a county seat, with no town at all. We found it now a live business place, with a railroad, on which could be heard the loud snort of the locomotive, where then the snort and whistle of the bounding stag was heard ; and where the wild turkey then gobbled almost unnoticed, we found railroads, banking and other monopolies gob- A hoosier's tramp. 45 bling up a great part of the proceeds of the farmer's labor. Leaving CHnton in the afternoon, we stopped some distance from the little village of Chilhovvee. From what I could learn from my host, who was comparatively an old settler, I was led to think we were near the spot where we fell in with Lester, in 1836. But how changed was the scene ! Instead of an almost boundless prairie, cov- ered with rank grass, through which a solitary Indian trail was found, I saw a country where field was joined unto field — the green fields of wheat and oats, and the lately planted fields of corn, the orchards and groves of shade-trees, where then scarcely a shrub or switch could be seen for miles. And instead of the straight and nar- row Indian trail, leading in a direct line to the west- northwest, we found broad wagon-roads, leading through lanes, zigzagging to the four cardinal points, and this as far as the eye could reach. I inquired for our old host of forty-three years before, the man of four hundred pounds weight. "Oh, yes," said our host, "Clark Davis; I have often heard of him, but he was dead before I came here." He said the old Shawnee trail was only remembered by the old pioneers ; that the present road to Westport would cross over it many times, but that the traveler will never travel on the old trail fifty yards at a stretch. I mentioned the singular mound that I had passed over in 1836. "Yes," said he; "that is called Centre Knob. You will pass three or four hundred j^ards north of it to-mor- row, with a farm on your left, and a railroad on the right, and a town just before you." I found our host a well-informed, talkative farmer; and on my asking if he ever knew John C. Lester, he said: "I never knew him, but I saw him hung; I was a boy then, and it was the first and last hanging I ever witnessed." The next morning I resumed my journey. The travel, the change of climate and scenery, or the excite- ment, had benefited me very materially, and the weather being fine, I set out in excellent spirits, and passed on through the prairie country, with farms, houses, and 46 RURAL RHYMES AND OLDKN TIMES. orchards on either hand, and came to the head of Bear Creek, where I inquired for the man whose cabin-logs I had passed when there before ; but the man said no such man as Isaac Dunaway had lived in that vicinity for thirty years. On and on; we passed first north and then west, all the time in a lane, till near noon we arrived at the town of Holden, a town of some three thousand inhabitants, on the Missouri Pacific Railroad ; from which point another railroad branches off, and runs southwest through Harri- sonville into Kansas. I was told that I was now a short distance north of the old Shawnee trail, and that the whole country north and south was under fence. Here, then, was a town of three thousand inhabitants, in a country where forty-three years before a traveler could find no place to stay over night ; a lively, bustling city, surrounded by farms which nobody then thought of entering, at a dollar and a quarter per acre ; many of which were entered, after the graduation law took effect, at twelve and a half cents per acre. We left Holden, and in two hours or less came opposite Centre Knob. I had a great curiosity to stand again upon its summit ; and, seeing a path leading up to it through the farm, we alighted, hitched the horse, and walked up to the top, and stood again upon that stony summit. But what a contrast was the view that I then had, with the sunset view that I had had so long ago ! Instead of one single solitary farm in sight, it was farm after farm, and farm joined to farm as far as I could see, north, south, east, and west. Four miles to the east was the town of Holden, with its thousands; and three-quar- ters of a mile to the west was the village of Kingsville. And instead of two or three smokes rising from distant and unseen farms, were now seen the, smoke from the fine flouring mill in Kingsville, and also from the mills and other machinery in Holden ; while a black column rose from a freight train moving west, and from another moving east, as they met and passed each other at Kings- ville ; the contrast was almost too great for my weak frame to bear. Returning to the carriage, we were soon in the streets of Kingsville, whicli, I was told, was situated immediately A hoosibr's tramp. 47 on the old Indian trail. Having promised a friend to attend to a small matter of business in Pleasant Hill, in Cass County (called Van Buren in 1836), I made inquiry as to the road and distance, and was told that it was on the railroad, the second station above, about twelve miles ; and that it was south of the old Shawnee trail. On my asking how far from where Wright's store was in 1836, my informant said it was the same place; the old store- house being one of the first houses ever built there. Leaving Kingsville late in the afternoon, we drove on and stopped in the little village of Strasburg for the night. After telling my landlord of my travels through Missouri in 1836, and describing our ride through the wide and desert prairie, and our night's lodging on the old trail, I asked if he knew where the young couple were. "Yes," said he, "I reckon I know who he is, but he lives in Jackson County now ; and his wife has been dead more than twenty years. He is an old, gray-headed man now, and you wouldn't know him." "I guess," said I, "that the little cabin has gone long ago." "Not all of it," he replied. "It has been moved and rebuilt two or three times, and a part of the logs may be seen now in a stable that stands on the farm where he was then living. By the way," said he, "you ought to see his book of poems, and read his description of that old cabin home." "Ah, indeed! has he turned author and poet? I would indeed give a shilling to see a description in rhyme of that little cabin, as I saw it then." "Well," said he, "I think I can get a copy of the book, for I know there are several in town." He stepped out and soon returned with a small vol- ume entitled "Rural Rhymes and Poems from the Farm," and, turning over the leaves, he^ pointed to one of the poems, entitled "The Old Cabin Home." "That old cabin," said he, "is the one in which you lodged that night." Putting on mj^ spectacles, I read as follows : 48 RURAL RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. THE OLD CABIN HOME. Written in 1874, and published in the Independence Sentinel. I passed an old cabin of logs to-day, Weather-beaten and worn and decayed; And it spoke to my mind of friends far away, And of loved ones by death lowly laid. That cabin was built in a wilderness here — 'Twas the verge of the settlement then — 'Twas built long ago by an old pioneer Who came in the van of white men ; It stood by the side of the old Shawnee Trace,* A trail by the Indians made As they moved to the west from their old home place, Where the bones of their fathers were laid. That old pioneer has gone long ago - Long since he was laid to his rest. And all his descendants, so far as I know. Have gone to a still farther West. I passed the old cabin, and sadly I mused — I wept and the tears fell fast — Though now for a stable the cabin is used, 'Twas my home in the years long past ; It spoke of life's joys, its sorrows and strife, And a morning in spring-time fair, When first setting out on the journey of life, That Mary and I came there. That old cabin home has sheltered us oft From the rains and the wintry blast; 'Neath its clapboard roof and its clapboard loft Many halcyon days I've passed. Ah ! dear to my heart is that old cabin yet, And the field where I followed the plow — That farm and that cabin I cannot forget. Though another possesses them now. That old-time roof has been gone long, long, And gone is the old puncheon floor, ='-This trace, or trail, was made before the country was settled by white men, and made by the Shawnee and Delaware Indians, as they removed from the Mississippi to their location above the mouth of the Kansas Kiver. A HOOSIER'S TRAMP. 49 And the wheel, and the loom, and Mary's sweet song Is heard in that cabin no more. 'Tis seldom I see the old cabin of late. But my thoughts to it often revert ; And if in my eyes the tears congregate, I feel that they do me no hurt. 'Twas there that my sons and daughters were born, And there it was some of them died ; Those blossoms of hope were cut down in the morn ; And Mary now lies by their side. 'Twas an humble abode, that cabin, I know, But I never again shall enjoy Another on earth, where the sweets of life flow With so little of bitter alloy. And now in the cold even-tide of my days, As the shadows are lengthening fast, I look from out of a dark'ning maze To the sunshine of days that are past. From out of that cabin's old timbers I fain Would carve me a staff, firm and strong, On which I can lean, as in weakness and pain. On life's journey I totter along. I am wayworn and weary; I soon shall go hence, And see my old home cabin no more ; But when I have quitted this world of offense, A home shall I find evermore. Ah, yes! there's a mansion prepared, bright and fair, For all who the race have well run ; And Mary, dear Mary, awaits for me there. As of old, till my day's work is done. I'm coming, dear Mary, I'll be at home soon ; The time of reunion draws nigh ; The morning has passed, it is long since noon. And the sun has sunk low in the sky; I'm leaving the scene of our labors and love — The old home I may nevermore see; But by faith I can see the fair mansion above. And a light in the window for me. While I was engaged in reading the poem, my host -4— 50 RURAL RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. picked up a daily newspaper, the Kansas City Times, I think, and for half an hour no^-hing was said. I finished the poem, and handed the book to my grandson, who was anxiously waiting for it; wiped my eyes and com- muned with my own thoughts, while the landlord and the boy read on. At length the gentleman laid down his paper and said: "I see by this paper that there is to be a meeting of the old settlers of Jackson, Cass, Clay, and Platte counties, at the fair grounds of Kansas City, next Satur- day, and that General Doniphan, the great orator and hero of Sacramento, in the Mexican War, is to deliver an oration ; and that your friend of the cabin is to read a poecn descriptive of old times; I should like to be there sure." "How far," said I, "is Kansas City from Westport?" "Oh! " said he, "they are almost the same. Westport is one of the suburbs of Kansas City, which now extends from the river almost to Westport, and up to the mouth of the Kaw." " I suppose, then, that it includes the steamboat land- ing of forty years ago?" "Yes; and all the country adjacent to it." "I can't see," said I, "how they could build much of a city amongst those hills and hollows." "Ah! those hills have to some extent been leveled down, and the hollows filled up. If you could be there, you would be astonished to see what has been done." " Well, then, I am going there. The route I had marked out was to Westport, which I visited in 1836; thence through Kansas and Arkansas, and then home. But I shall be at Kansas City, at that old settlers' meet- ing; and now, while I think of it, did you ever know anything of an old settler of Jackson County by the name of Savage? " " Yes, old Jimmy Savage ; I can just remember hear- ing him preach when I was a child, but I have heard him spoken of so often that I almost seem to have known hini always. He moved, as I have heard, to Texas, and some of his family are there yet." "If I am not mistaken," said I, "he lived near lyone Jack; how far is that from here?" A hoosier's tramp. 5 1 " Seven miles north." I then informed him of my intention to visit that place, and for what purpose ; and asked if he or any of his neighbors were in that battle. "I was not there," said he, "but some of my neigh- bors were. A friend of mine, in town here, was living there then, and his house was burned and his wife was killed during the action." And when I asked how that happened, he replied : "The Union soldiers were in the house — a large hotel — fighting from it, when the Confederates set fire to the house ; that his friend's wife and mother then fled to a field, grown up in weeds, and lay down amongst them, and while there his wife was struck by a rifle-ball, inflicting a mortal wound." I asked then, as I had to go to Pleasant Hill and intended visiting I^one Jack, Independence, and Westport, what would be the best route. " I think," said he, " I would go to Pleasant Hill first, and from there to lyone Jack, and then to Independ- ence." Having resolved to follow the route suggested, I left early in the morning, and in a few hours was in Pleasant Hill ; but it bore no resemblance to the site of the soli- tary store-house of the county in 1836. I found the business part of the town on a flat or bottom prairie, instead of on a hill, and thought the town had the wrong name. It was, however, a good large town, or would be if the vacant places were filled up ; a population of 2,000 or 3,000, and doing a large business; situated on the Missouri Pacific Railroad, with another road branching off and running to Lawrence (the principal town in Kan- sas), and other railroad connections contemplated in the near future. Having attended to my business in town, I set off to lyOne Jack. Leaving the depot, I left the low lands, and, ascending a gradual rise, we passed several fine churches, a large school-building, and passed through what a gen- tleman who rode with us told us was Middletown, and finally the old town of Pleasant Hill, on the high ridge that I had seen before. At my request the gentleman pointed out the site of the cabin where Wright was sell- 52 RURAL RHYMKS AND OLDKN TIMES. a ing goods in 1836. "The log cabin," he said, "has been pulled down long ago, and that fine brick residence yon- der occupies its site. His daughter and her husband, Mr. Broadhead, live there now." We were now on the high land, with its extensive view ; but it was a very different view from the one I had from the same spot when there before. Instead of the Mission road, leading off through the wild prairie grass, on which old Jimmy Savage was seen wending his way, we were in a broad thoroughfare ; in a lane bounded on one side by a corn-field and by an orchard on the other, with lanes and corn and wheat-fields and farm-houses as far as could be seen. The road to lyone Jack, with the exception of a mile or so through the woods on the creek, was by and between those farms, and through lanes zigzagging north and east. About a mile before reaching the town, we fell in with a plain, farmer-looking man trudging along on foot towards the town. On my asking him if he could show me where the Union soldiers were buried there, he said: "I reckon I can; I helped to bury them." "Ah, indeed! were you there in that fight? " "No," said he; "I'm not a fightin' man myself; I wasn't there in the fight, but I was pretty soon after." "You were not a soldier, then, on either side? " " No, sir ; I was living close by, and as soon as the fight was all over I came into town to see if I could be of any service to those who were hurt." "Well," said I, "I have a son buried there, and I wish to see his resting-place. Will you get up and ride with us and point out the spot? " On arriving at the summit of the ridge separating the Big Creek from Sni-a-Bar, I saw to the right, in a corn- field separated from the town by a hedge, a marble shaft, the inscription on which informed -me that it had been erected in memory of the Confederate dead who fell on the 1 6th of August, 1862. M}^ friendly guide informed me that he could not point out any particular soldier's grave- " They were all buried in a promiscuous manner in this long trench," pointing to a slightly raised mound, sixty or eighty feet in length by six or seven in width, sodded over with blue grass. A hoosikr's tramp. 53 The Confederate dead were buried a few paces to the east, very much in the same manner, except that they were designated at the time by head-boards with their names written upon them, which have nearly all disap- peared. Near the south end of the Confederate mound, the monument, some fifteen or sixteen feet high, was erected, costing about $i,ooo. This- monument was erected by voluntary contributions from friends of the "Lost Cause," and stands only a few feet from where the lone tree that gave the town its name was then stand- ing. It had died the year before, and fell a few years after, and no vistage of it now remains. I asked my good-natured friend to tell me some of the particulars of the burial, and how they were put away. He answered that they were buried in a hurried manner, for help was scarce. "I was requested," said he, "by the Federal surgeon, who had remained behind when the soldiers retreated, to assist in gathering up and hauling the dead to a place of burial. While I and some others were at this, some eighteen or twenty prisoners were engaged in digging the grave, or trench, to put them in. We did not get them buried that day, and the next morning another Union army, under Generals Blunt and Warren, came in sight, and the Southern sol- diers left in a hurry, and the Federals after them, and the citizens were left to finish burying the dead, to take care of the wounded, and get the dead horses 'out of town, which was a heavy task. The dead were all laid in the trench side by side, heads and feet alternately toward the sun -rising, so as to occupy less space." I asked how many Union soldiers were laid beneath that mound. " I cannot say certainly," said he. " When the battle ended there were forty dead upon the ground, others died before night, and I have heard it said there were thirteen others dead next morning and some others died before the ambulances came from Lexington to carry the wounded off; so that I guess there is not less than sixty lying there now." "And how many on the other side are in this other trench on the east? " "Near about the same number. Fifty-nine head- 54 RURAI, RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. boards were counted a week or two after, and some were carried away and buried in other places." Here, then, thought I, beneath this grassy mound lies that loved son of mine ; and there lies the hope of many a fond parent's heart. Here lies the gallant son, the devoted brother, the affectionate father, the loving husband, and the patriotic soldier, who laid down their lives in their country's defense; and that country has placed no stone to mark their last resting-place ; and sorrowing and surviving friends can place no head-stone at the loved one's grave because no one can know under what part of this long mound the loved one reposes. Bidding a sad adieu to the soldiers' grave, and a kind farewell to my obliging and stranger guide, I passed through the little village made historic with what is said to have been the hardest fought contest in the State during the whole war, and before night was some miles on my way to Independence. There were a good many young folks where I staid, and a good deal of mirth and jollity, and as the events of the day had unfitted me for enjoying their amuse- ments, I asked leave to retire early, and consequently had but little conversation with the worthy man of the house. Next morning I found that he had lived nearly all his life in Jackson County (nearly fifty years). I asked if there was any road leading to Savage's or Haw- kins' mill, on the lyittle Blue. " I reckon not," said he ; " that old mill has not run for more than thirty years, and the country is so fenced up that I would not know how to get there. And to go to Independence now, we must go the public road bj^ lyce's Summit, or else by Blue Springs." " Do you know any person near Independence by the name of Stayton ?" " I used to know several of them,", was the reply. "And do they live on either of these roads?" " Yesi; on the Blue Springs road." " Then direct me that way." Receiving my directions, I set out and passed on through a fine prairie country in a fine state of cultiva- tion, but I thought some of the farms were too large, and that some men were monopolizing more of mother earth A hoosier's tramp. 55 than was good for the community at large. The soil appeared to be excellent, the richest and fairest portion of the State I had yet seen. It was not many hours till we came to a town lately laid out on a new railroad, the Chicago & Alton, and were told it was the town of Blue Springs, which has a beautiful site, as well as a beautiful country surrounding it. After noon we came to the farm where I was told Mr. Stayton lived many years ago. I found the house as it was then, on the summit of a ridge of woodland, but everything was changed. A fine brick house stood near by where the old one had been ; the farm was enlarged, and other farms and farm houses were in close proximity. We stopped for dinner. The old man, as I expected, was dead — had been for many years. I asked for his sons — the boys I had seen. They, too, were dead. A daughter-in-law was living on the old homestead. I was disappointed again ; I had expected to see at least some of the younger members of the family. I was in hop^, too, that I would pass by and see the old log meeting- house, but was told that the road had been changed and no longer ran that way, and that the old house was no longer in being, but a brick church in town was now used in its place. As I was getting ready to start, a light wagon with two old men and an elderly woman passed by, going toward the town, and the young man with whom I had been conversing asked me if I was going to the old settlers' meeting at Kansas City. On my saying that I expected to be there, he remarked, " There go some old folks now, and I guess they are going there too." We drove on slowly after the wagon till we reached town. Everything was strange again. We entered the town from the south, instead of from the east, as before ; and, before reaching the public square, crossed a railroad that runs through the town, and were told that there were two others in less than a mile of that one. The public square looked something the same, but the court- house was larger, taller, and far more imposing, and fenced around with an iron fence. The town was much larger, the buildings larger and taller ; but this was no more than I had expected. I drove to the southwest 56 RURAL RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. corner of the square and looked for the store of Samuel C. Owens ; but the one-story frame building was not there ; on the corner where it stood was a large two- story brick building, the banking house of Chrisman & Sawyer. The carriage ahead of me stopped in front of the post-office, near the bank, and I drew up at the same place. Drawing near, I entered into conversation with the oldest of the two men, asking if he had much acquaintance in the place. "Very little," said he; "in fact, scarcely any now. The time was Vv'hen I knew everybody here, and every- body knew me. But now I know nobody, and nobody knows me." " You are an old settler, then," I observed. "Yes; one of the oldest. I cut the first logs for a cabin that were cut in the town. That was fifty-five years ago, and the most of them were cut on the Temple L/Ot, out west here — the lot that the Mormons claim the grand Temple of the New Jerusalem is to be built upon." "Then you were fortunate in selecting your home, as,' no doubt, the county or somebody paid you well for it." " Not so fortunate, either," he replied; " for I lost my labor in cutting the logs. Another pioneer informed me that I was trespassing on his claim, and when he showed me that he had marked off" his claim a few days before I did mine, I gave it up and selected another a few miles east of here." "Then," said I, "you know all the first settlers, I sup- pose." "Yes; nearly all." "Did you know the Baptist preacher. Savage?" " Oh, yes ; I knew him, and Stayton, and Fitzhugh, and Powell, and Jackson, and some others. In fact, I believe I knew more men then, as thinly settled as the county was, than I do now, when it has its eighty thousand inhabitants." "Are any of your family living?" "Yes; this is my son," pointing to the other old man, "and this is his wife. He was a small boy when I came here, and his wife was the first female white child born in the county." A hoosier's tramp. 57 "Then I suppose you are going to the old settlers' meeting to-morrow?" "Yes; we will be there if nothing happens." I then bade him good-by, and expressed a hope tliat I should see him next day. I found Westport not much larger than when I saw it before, but everything was changed there, too. The Indian and the Mexican were not there ; the store-houses were larger, but doing a smaller business; of Santa Fe and Chihuahua traders, their wagons and teams, none were to.be seen; of the mountain and fur traders and trappers, I saw none. Instead of the lazy Indian and Mexican, I saw the Dutch and Irish laborers. Instead of the ox and mule wagons, I saw the street cars, the pleasure car- riages, hacks and omnibuses passing to and from Kansas City every few minutes,, while the large wagon and yoke factory was no longer there. I put up at a private boarding-house and had a good night's rest, my host telling me how the glory of West- port and its western trade departed when the Territory of Kansas was settled and the city of Ivcavenworth sprang into existence. Next morning we drove north, as before, but how different the appearance of everything ! The road was a broad macadamized thoroughfare, which led down towards the river, and on this road was an iron track, on which the street cars went and came every few minutes ; and instead of the few small cabins and corn-patches, there Avere stately residences, vineyards, orchards, and gard- ens, until the city proper was reached. Then for hours I drove from point to point, over that once hilly, rough, and unsightly landscape ; viewing the principal places of interest in this great metropolis of the West. Hiring a guide, we drove in various directions, visited the water- works, the foundries, the packing-houses, the machine- shops, and the principal publishing houses; thence to the Union Depot, where nine railroads have already come, and others are soon coming; then to the great iron bridge, across the mad Missouri, up to the mouth of the Kaw, and across that river into the State of Kansas and city of Wyandotte, and back to the fair grounds about 58 RURAL RHYMES AND OI.DEN TIMES. noon, where the old settlers of Jackson and her neigh- boring counties were assembled. We found those old pioneers, with many of younger years, congregated in small gioups under the shade-trees, partaking of the picnic or basket dinner, and enjoying the pleasures of social converse. It was a pleasant day, and all nature seemed to smile on those old pioneers, who had so long ago seen the land in the garb in which nature clothed it. Soon after dinner it was announced from the stand that General Doniphan, the expected orator of the day, was not in attendance, and that some of the old pioneers would entertain the assem^bled hundreds with some remi- niscences of the olden times. By the aid and assistance of my hired guide, who had accompanied me, I obtained a seat where I could hear. The Hon. Jacob Gregg, the president of the Old Set- tlers' Association, one of Jackson County's oldest citizens, one of its first sheriffs, and one who had served in the State L^egislature, was first introduced. He said he had been requested to say something about the early pioneers of the country, as he supposed, because he was one of the oldest now remaining. "For this," he said, "I claim no merit. Pioneers are like other men — no better, and I trust no worse. That I was an early pioneer in this county was perhaps owing to accident — a train of circumstances over which I had but little, if any, control ; and that I am here to-day, one amongst the very few of those early pioneers who have been spared by the hand of death, is owing to accident or a multiplicity of accidents or circumstances that not my hand nor any other human hand could control. I presume it is safe to say that of one hundred who came here as early as I did, ninety-nine are gone, and it is not owing to any superior sagacity, prudence, foresight, or energy on my part that I have been spared and that my com- panion in life has also been spared, and that we are both with you here to-day. It has been a long, long time since I first came to the county of Jackson, in 1825; but I have not forgotten the lives we lived in the backwoods here then, those woods in which the track of the Indian A hoosier's tramp. 59 might be said to still remain, and from which his war- whoop had scarcely died away. " I have not forgotten those days of hog and hominy — especially the hominy, which these hands have many a time beaten. I have not forgotten our many hunting excursions in quest of the deer and other wild game, and the wild bees and their honey, dressed as we were in the skins of the deer. I have not forgotten the simplicity of pioneer life, and its sociability. I remember the old- fashioned preachers and the preaching of those days; and how the girls would walk barefooted, and carry their shoes and stockings in their hands till near the meeting- place, and would then sit down and put them on. I remember the country as it was before there were good wagon-roads, much less railroads, in the country. I remember when Independence was a corn-patch, and when Kansas City was nowhere, and the whole tract on which it stands could have been bought for almost a song. I remember the old bar-share plow, the bull-tongue, the shovel-plow and the carey, the scythe and the cradle, the reap-hook and the flail, before the age of machinery had come. No doubt you too remember these things. Many of my old, gray-headed friends have, I know, like me, forgotten many things that have since occurred; but those scenes of simplicity and happiness are and will be remembered until reason fails or memory is dethroned. " I am happy to meet so many of my old pioneer friends here to-day, and with you rejoice in this one more reunion. But I am disappointed, as all of you are, in the non-arrival of that old and eloquent pioneer. Gen. Doniphan, who we expected would entertain us with his eloquence to-day. And as I am no speaker, and cannot fill his place, I will give place to some one that can talk." This short speech was well received, as it deserved to be; and the next speaker was a stout, square-built man, who looked as though he might be in the prime of life, but who was in reality older than he appeared to be. I was told that it was the great Government contractor, or freighter, of twenty-five years ago, who for years had a monopoly of freighting Government stores to the Indians and the western forts, and was largely engaged in the Santa Fe transportation and trade. 6o RURAL RHYMES AMD OLDEN TIMES. He announced himself as Aleck Majors, the ox-driver, and said he was no longer a citizen of Jackson or any adjoining county, and not even a citizen of the State, but that he had stopped on his way from New York to his home at Salt lyake, to spend the day with his old pioneer friends in Western Missouri. "And," said he, "I am happy to meet with so many of them. I have enjoyed the last few hours immensely, in conversation with first one and then another of the old pioneers that I knew in my youth. I came with my father, Benjamin Majors, to this county in 1825, almost as soon as the Indians had left it. Some of you know where Majors' old mill stood, on the Little Blue, fifty years ago. I was just big enough then to ride the near steer and drive a yoke of oxen, and how many thousand I have driven since I don't know. "In conversing with my old friends to-day, my mind and my memory have been refreshed and carried back, and I have been reminded of many things I had almost forgotten amid the turmoil of trade and the busy scenes of life; but while some of the incidents of those early years have in a measure faded from my memory, there are others that seem to be stamped upon it forever. The boys that I went to school with are remembered yet ; the boys that I played marbles with I have not forgotten; neither have I forgotten the girls, that were then more attractive in my estimation than anything else; I have not forgotten how social, how friendly and accommodat- ing those early settlers were with each other. "The log-rollings, the house-raisings, the corn-shuck- ings, the sewings, and the quiltings that were so common amongst them ; when the youngsters would meet together and work all day and dance all night ; or, if the old folks were too pious to allow dancing, the}'- would play Quebec or Old Sister Phebe. Some of you old folks have been there; you know how it is, or how it was; and may be some of you are like I am — you would like to be back there again. Yes, I've played Sister Phebe. I think I remember the first time that I ever enjoyed that good old play that so many ten thousands have played before and since. It was at my father's, at a log-rolling or house- raising, or something of the kind, when the boys and girls of the whole neighborhood were there. I remember their A hoosier's tramp. 6i names yet. One tall, good-looking young man, or bache- lor, was there with the girl that he afterwards married ; his name was Jake Gregg. How plainly I seem to see them now; how vividly his image and hers rise up before me, and I fancy I see them as they march round on the puncheon floor; and I can almost hear him singing — " 'Heigh-ho! Sister Phebe, how merry were we. That night we sat under the juniper-tree! That juniper-tree, heigh-ho ! ' "I do wonder if I ever shall see that old friend again ? Can anybody tell me whether he or his wife is here to- day?" "Yes, they are both here," was answered; and the aged president, Mr. Gregg, rose to his feet and received a hearty hand-shaking from the speaker, and Mr. Majors continued, "God bless you, my old friend! How happy I am to meet you here to-day, after so many years spent apart, amid the toils and turmoils of an unfriendly world. Do you, my old friend, call to mind the incident I have just mentioned?" "I remember it well'' said Gregg. "Thank heaven, the pleasures of memory never fail! thank heaven that though old age and infirmity may come upon us, and losses and crosses afflict us, and a weight of sorrow may weigh us down, in memory we can go back to the happy days of youth and live over again the brighter scenes of early life; and though adversity, with frowning features may stare us in the face, we can shut our eyes and call up in memory the days of greater prosperity and live them over again ! And now, before I sit down, let me say to the ladies, that though I live at Salt I^ake among the Mormons, I have but one wife — the one I found in the good old county of Jackson — and if I should unfortunately lose that one and desire another, I think I would certainly come back here to look for her." Some other short speeches were made, pertinent and to the point; and it was announced from the stand that the poet of Van Buren Township would read a poem of old times and old pioneers. I had been curious to see my old friend of the cabin, but had not as yet got a sight of him. He came forward, as I thought, with the same awkward manner he had in 62 RURAL RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. his youth, but no longer a boy in appearance. Some- what bent with age and with hair almost as white as the snow, he unrolled his manuscript. The secretary ap- pealed to the audience for order and quiet, as the reader's voice was not of the strongest. I give the poem as it appeared next morning in the Kansas City Times, with- out any comment of my own : TALK TO THE SETTLERS OF JACKSON, CLAY, CASS' AND PLATTE. 'Tis almost half a hundred years Since you and I, old pioneers, With aspirations free, A home within this region sought ; But who of us then dreamed or thought To see the many changes wrought, That we have lived to see? From different countries then we came. Our aims, our objects all the same — A home in this far West. A cabin here and there was found. Perhaps a little spot of ground Enclosed and cleared, while all around In nature's garb was dressed. Here, then, we saw the groves of green, Where woodman's axe had never been — The spreading prairies too. Within those groves, so dense and dark, Was heard the squirrel's saucy bark ; The bounding stag was but the mark To prove the rifle true. But all is changed. The cabin's gone ; The clapboard roof with weight-poles on, The rough-hewn puncheon-floor. The chimneys made of stick and clay. Are seen no more — gone to decay. The men that built them, where are they? I need not ask you more. They're gone, but they're remembered yet. Those cabin homes we can't forget, Although we're growing old. A hoosier's tramp. • 63 Fond memory still the spot reveres — The cabin homes of youthful years, Where, with compatriot pioneers. We pleasures had untold; The dense and tangled woodland too. The groves we often wandered through, No longer now are there. The prairie, with its sward of green And flowerets wild, no more is seen; But farms, with dusty lanes between. Are seen where once they were. Large towns and villages arise, And steeples point toward the skies, Where all was desert then; And Nature's scenes have given place To those of Art; the hunter's chase Has yielded to the scrambling race Of speculating men. The very spot on which we stand — This city, so superb and grand — How did we see it then? How wild was that forbidding scene? The hills, with gorges thrown between, As though by nature it had been Made for a panther's den. Those hills have since been leveled down. The gorges filled, the streets of town In all directions range. The labors of ten thousand hands. The working-men from thousand lands, The energy that wealth commands, Have wrought the wondrous change. Ah ! what a change the pioneer, In forty years, has witnessed here ! And things are changing still. Those streets and alleys then were not; Its greatest thoroughfare was — what? A ground-hog's walk, or 'possum- trot, Which led from hill to hill. 64 RURAIv RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. Ah, yes! my friends, old pioneers, Full many a change within those years The country's undergone. How many changes it's passed through ! And we, old friends, are changing too. There's been a change in me and you, And still that change goes on. And when we think upon the past. Those friends whose lot with us was cast On this once wild frontier. And pass them all in brief review. As oftentimes in thought we do — Alas! alas! how very few Are there remaining here ! A few more years will come and go, As other years have done, you know. And then — ah, yes ! what then ? The world will still be moving on ; But we, whose cheeks are growing wan. Will not be here — we'll all be gone From out the ranks of men. Our places will be vacant here. And of the last old pioneer The land will be bereft. The places which we here have filled. The fields which we have cleared and tilled. Our barns, though empty, or though filled, To others will be left. But ere we pass to that far bourne From which no traveler can return. We meet, old pioneers; The few of us who yet remain. And we who here have met, would fain Now clasp those friendly hands again We clasped in by-gone 5^ears. In glad reunion now we meet. Each other once again to greet And conversation hold ; A hoosikr's tramp, 65 And while we socially to-day A few brief hours may while away, L,et us, although our heads are gray, Forget that we are old. Ivet us go back — in memory go — Back to the scenes of long ago. When we were blithe and young; When hope and expectation bright Were buoyant and our hearts were light, And Fancy, that delusive sprite, Her siren sonnets sung. And as we join in friendly chat, We'll speak of this, and talk of that, And of the many things That have occurred within the land Since first the little squatter band Came to this country, now so grand! Before 'twas ruled by rings. 'Tis natural that we should think, While standing on the river's brink. How wide the stream has grown ! We saw it when 'twas but a rill. Just bursting from the sunny hill; And now its surging waters fill A channel broad, unknown. 'Tis natural, and proper too, That we compare the old and new. The present with the past, And speak of those old-fogy ways In which we passed our younger days; Then of the many new displays That crowd upon us fast. We little knew of railioads then, Nor dreamed of that new period when We'd drive the iron horse ; And 'twould have made the gravest laugh, Had he been told but only half The wonders of the telegraph, Then in the brain of Morse. 66 RURAI. RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. We did not have machinery then To sow and reap and thresh the grain, But all was done by hand; And those old-fashioned implements Have long ago been banished hence, Or rusting lie beside the fence — No longer in demand. Yes, there are grown-up men, I trow, Who never saw a bull-tongue plow, A flail, or reaping-hook; ^nd who could not describe, j^ou know, A swingling-knife or board, although Their mothers used them long ago, And lessons on them took. The young man now would be amused To see some things his father used — Some things he ne'er has seen ; The way in which we cleaned our wheat. When two strong men with blanket-sheet, Would winnow out the chaff and cheat. And twice or thrice the thing repeat, Until the grain was clean. The single-shovel plow and hoe. To clean out weeds, was all the show — We knew no better ways ; But now our sons would laugh to scorn Such poky ways of making corn. And bless the stars that they were born In more enlightened days. They say the world is wiser grown; They've got the speaking talkaphone — Talks twenty miles or more — And preachers now may preaoh and pray To congregations miles away ; And many other things, they say. We never had before. And yet I do not know but what The pioneer enjoyed his lot. And lived as much at ease A HOOSIER'S tramp. 67 As men in these enlightened days, With all their strange new-fangled ways, That wealth and fashion now displays The mind of man to please. 'Tis true, we did not live as fast, But socially our time was passed, Although our homes were mean. Our neighbors then were neighbors true. And every man his neighbor knew. Although those neighbors might be few. And sometimes far between. Ah, yes ! old pioneers, I trow The world was brighter then than now To us gray-headed ones ; Hope pointed us beyond the vale. And whispered us a fairy tale Of coming pleasures, ne'er to fail Through all the shining suns. Ambition, too, with smile so soft, Was pointing us to seats aloft, Where fame and honors last. We had not learned what now we know — The higher up the mount we go The storms of life still fiercer blow, And colder is the blast. That though we reach the mountain's top. Fruition find of every hope, Or wear the victor's crown ; Though far above the clouds we tread — There's other clouds still overhead, And on the mind there is the dread — The dread of coming down. Ah, yes ! old settlers, one and all, Whatever may us yet befall. We will not — can't forget The simple, plain, old-fashioned plan — The routes in which our fathers ran, Before the age of steam began To run the world in debt. 68 RURAL RHYMES AND OI.DEN TIMES. And while we talk upon the past, Of those who are dropping off so fast, And those already gone, It may not be, my friends, amiss For each of us to think of this : The curtain of forgetfulness Will soon be round us drawn. And though in glad reunion we Have met to-day, perhaps 'twill be A day of taking leave ; And we, who oft have met before, And parted in the days of yore — Will part, perhaps, to meet no more, When we shall part this eve. The mind goes back through all the years. We call to mind the pioneers — Those bold and hardy men. We pass them in the mind's review — The many dead, the living few — Those unpretending farmers who Were our compatriots then. Men who of toil were not afraid, Men who the early history made Of this now famous land ; The men who, ere the Mormons came This heritage so fair to claim. Were here, prepared through flood and flame Those claimants to withstand. Sam Lucas, Boggs and Swearingen, The Nolands and the Fristoes then. The Greggs and Owens too ; The Davises and the Flournoys, The Kings, the Staytons and McCoys, And Dealy, with his twenty boys — All these and more we knew. The Wilsons and the Adamses, The Irvings and the Lewises, The Webbs and the Fitzhughs, A hoosie;r'vS tramp. 69 The Powells and the Harrises, The Walkers and the Burrisses, The Bakers and the Savages, The Hickmans, Woods and Pughs. Yes, some of these were noted men, Well-known and much respected then, Although their coats were plain; And when in office they were placed. They proved themselves not double-faced, The people's trust was not misplaced — We need such men again. We had our courts of justice then — A terror to dishonest men, Who feared the halter's drop. Judge Ryland then the courts could hold, In full a dozen counties told, Decide the cases manifold, And keep with business up. We had our lawyers, too, but they. Or nearly all, have passed away — We looked for one of them to-day, A brave and fluent man — But we are disappointed sore; That man of fame and legal lore, Perhaps we'll never see here more — Brave Colonel Doniphan. Where now are all his old compeers. The lawj'ers 'mongst the pioneers — Charles French, and Hicks and Young? Where now are both the Recces gone? And where is Hovey — noisy one? And where is David Atchison, The man of fiery tongue? They're gone ! you say 'tis ever thus ; The men of note are leaving us — The men of greatest heft. But when we pause and look around, A few whose heads are 'bove the ground, A few perhaps may yet be found — Sawyer and Woodson's left. 70 RURAI, RHYMES AND OI.DEN TIMKS. And then we had our preachers, too, And some of them, I think, you knew, And knew their Christian walk. And who of you that ever heard Joab Powell preach the word But had his better feelings stirred By plain and simple talk? McKinney, Ferrill, Nelson too, Stayton, Warder and Fitzhugh, Tillery, Rice and Hill. And there was Elder Kavanaugh; And any one that ever saw Old Jimmy Savage, sure can draw A picture of him still. Ah, yes ! the preachers of those days Were noted for their simple ways, And some for style uncouth; But they are gone ; they all are dead ; Another class are in their stead, Much better paid and better read; But have they more of truth? But time would fail to speak of all The changes that our minds recall Upon life's shifting waves; And soon those shifting waves will bear The last old pioneer to where His lost and loved companions are lyow in their silent graves. But ere, my friends, we hence embark, We fain would place some lasting mark Upon this mundane shore; A mark the traveler may see In coming years, and know that we Have lived and passed the road that he May then be passing o'er. When death's dark curtain shall be drawn. And we old pioneers are gone, Let truthful history tell A HOOSIER S TRAMP, 7 1 To far posterity the tale, As down the stream of Time thej^ sail, How we with motto, "Never Fail," Came here, and what befell. I^et history then, impartial, state The incidents of early date ; And that it so may do, lyet pioneers of every age In this important work engage, And each of them produce his page — ' A page of history true. The incidents of early years, Known only to the pioneers, With them will soon be lost, Unless before they hither go, Those incidents are stated so Posterity the facts may know, When we the stream have crossed. After the speaking was over, I introduced myself to the gray-haired poet, and found that he remembered my night's lodging with him, and several of the incidents; said he recollected my making the memorandum the next morning, and of our lonely ride through the prairie ; passing Centre Knob, and getting lost. I asked him about the new beginner across the branch, and he replied : "He is yet living, like me, in the decline of life; has had his 'ups and downs,' and more 'downs' than 'ups.' lyike me, he is a widower, having lost two wives and some of his children. His health was impaired in the sei'vice during the Rebellion, but he is in the enjoyment of a pension that will keep him comfortably through life's evening." I remarked that I supposed the Government land in that half a township was all taken up now. "Yes, indeed," said he; "and instead of only five families on it, and half a dozen children of school age, there are three school districts, with their school-houses, and three churches, besides the village of Strasburg. Not only that township," said he, "has been all bought long ago, but the condemned land, not worth surveying once, has been bought, every acre of it, and is nearly all under 72 RURAL liHYMES AND OI.DKN TIMES. fence, and instead of a voting population of 200, the county has over 5,000." Next morning I left for Kansas, and in eight weeks returned to my home with restored health, and a better opinion of Missouri and Kansas than I had before I set out. ''IS THE WORLD ANY WORSEN' Uncle Ben and Charley. — Dialogue. Charley. — Well, Uncle Ben, what is your opinion on the question for debate to-morrow night? Is the world growing any worse? Uncle Ben. — Well, I can't sa}^ ; but I suppose the world, on an average, is pretty much the same as it was a hun- dred years ago. In some respects changed, but still the same old world. Charley. — Yes, but the people are not the same ; and the question, I suppose, is, whether they are better or worse. Ben. — It is said that human nature is the same the world over, and in every age ; and I suppose that this is no better, and no worse, now than a thousand years ago. Circumstances change, and they may, perhaps, be more or less favorable for the development of the good or bad in human nature than formerly ; while other circum- stances may enable us to see and to realize the good and evil tendencies and consequences more plainly now than we did then. Ever since I can recollect, it has been said that the olden times were better then than the present ; and I suppose the same thing was said in Solomon's day, for he says in the book of Ecclesiastes : "Say not what is the cause that the former days were better than these, for thou dost not inquire wisely concerning these things." As much as to say, that it was not the case. And again he says : "The thing that hath been, it is that that shall be ; and that which is done, is that which shall be done; and there is no new thing under the sun." And he says again : "There is no remembrance of former things," IS THK WORI,D ANY WORSE;.'' 73 intimating that we are liable to forget how bad the former times were; and from the whole of his writings, I aoi inclined to think that mankind has not changed much since his day. The same evils we complain of, he com- plained of, and describes them better than we can. Charley. —But, Uncle Ben, was there ever before such a rage for speculation, swindling, public plunder, and crime in general as now, when swindling and public plundering is general all over the land, and railroad and other monopolies are grinding the laboring classes to death, and the smartest man is the one that can get his hand the deepest into the public purse and gobble up the biggest slice of the public land? Was it always so, or was it so in your younger days? Ben. — -Well, in my boyhood we had no railroads to plunder and swindle us, and very few corporations of any kind ; and those few were so far off as to be out of sight. We did not read the newspapers, and hear of every wicked thing that transpired then, as we do now ; and hence, I say, we did not see or perceive the evil consequences of a vicious human nature then as we do now ; though there were no railroads and but few banking corporations to gobble up the public domain and put their hands into the national purse, there were others who attempted to, and perhaps did, play the same game that those corporations and sharks have since played; avarice has been avarice always, and there never has been a time when some indi- vidual or company was not ready to grind the poor labor- ing classes and fleece the public. As early as 1788, a Mr. John L/ivingston and others formed themselves into a company to fleece the Indians and the people of New York out of more than half the lands of that great State. They entered into a contract with the Six Nations to lease the lands of nearly all Western New York for 999 years, for an annual rent of $3,500; but the Legislature of New York interfered in the matter, and Governor Clinton, by proclamation, forbade any person to occupy any part of the territory under that lease, and the scheme was broken up. Charley. — That shows that Ivivingston and his com- pany wasn't smart. If they had done as modern specu- lators do, they would have given the members of the 74 RURAL RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. lyCgislature and Governor Clinton a share in the loaf; and then it might have been different, you know. Ben. — Perhaps so ; but lyivingston's company may have been more grasping than modern ones, and wanted all the profits themselves ; and perhaps the I^egislature had a scheme of their own to gobble up the land, and was not willing to divide with Livingston and his com- pany ; at any rate, the scheme failed. Andagain in 1795 or '96, another land-jobbing scheme was concocted to gobble up the entire State of Michigan. This was by Messrs. Randall, Whitney, and some other Indian traders. They came to Congress with their scheme, and did offer some members an interest in it if they would vote for it. It so happened, however, that they made the offer to at least one member who was honest enough to expose the whole thing before it came up for action ; and then those who might have favored it did not dare do so. I am disposed to think, though, that some of them would have gone into it if there had been a prospect of success and no danger of exposure. The Indians, however, in both cases lost their lands in the end ; and you must admit that the white man's monopoly has been gobbling up their lands for 200 years or more. And as I am so often giving talks and tales of olden times, I will show you a long talk of the Oneida Indians, sent by their chiefs to the Legislature of New York, in relation to that lease of their lands to Livingston & Company, and as boys like to read things in rhyme better than in plain prose, and as Indian talks are always poetical, I change the words a little so as to rhyme, preserving the substance and sense the same. TALK OF THE ONEIDA INDIANS, SENT BY THEIR CHIEFS TO THE LEGISLATURE OF NEW YORK, IN 1788. Brothers, sachems, chiefs, and great men, Who sit round the great council fire Of our brothers, the people and State of New York, Your attention we ask and desire; Brothers, white brothers, we thus far had come To meet at your great council fire; IS THE WORLD ANY WORSE? 75 But the roads are now bad, and a prospect for worse Induces us home to retire. Brothers, — we speak now in writing, — your allies we are ; A free people we ever have been; Our chiefs have enjoined us to speak thus to you — Kars open, and take our words in : Brothers, white men, in your late and long war With the people across the great deep. At a time when thick darkness had covered the land, The Oneidas were not then asleep. Uninvited we took up the hatchet for you. Stepped forth in our brothers' defense ; We fought side by side ; your friends we then were. And friends we have been ever since ; Our blood flowed together, the bones of our men Were mingled with yours in the grave ; You grateful appeared for what we had done. And repeated assurances gave. That should the Great Spirit ever give you success, Your Indian friends should rejoice ; The result of the war was propitious to you. And we returned to the home of our choice. Desolation and ruin the land had o'erspread ; Our towns and our fields were a waste ; We rejoiced, however, that we could return; That the fruits of a peace we could taste. We pleased ourselves with the^hope that in peace We could quietly rest on our shores — A home for which we had fought and had bled. In a cause that was common with yours. While flattering ourselves with these prospects and thoughts, lyooking forward with hope and desire, Invitation we had to meet with your chiefs At Herkimer's great council fire. We were pleased— we were glad — and quickly set out To meet them, of nothing afraid — Expecting that they our wants would supply. And make good the assurances made. 76 RURAL RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES- The assurances given; so oftentimes made, With a grave and truthful-like voice, That when from the war to our homes we returned. Our hearts should be made to rejoice. The chiefs who then met us no doubt recollect Our disappointment, so sad and so sore, When they told us they came to purchase our land; No other commission they bore. Brothers, 'tis needless to mention in this The speeches we then and there made. You can not forget them — you've written them down In books whose words never fade. Your chiefs may remember how loth we then were To enter on treaties of trade ; They may also remember the means we then took That treaty and sale to evade. By proposing to lease a part for a time; (To sell we were not then inclined.) The contempt with which that offer was met Is doubtless still fresh in their mind. If memory has failed them, 'tis not so with us; Those things we remember full well. In compliance, at last, with their urgent request, We consented to sell, and did sell; In consequence, though, of a most solemn pledge. By our greatest and chief sachem given, That this was the last demand for our lands. And that we should no further be driven. We sold you a part of our lands and our homes, And the homes of our fathers before ; But in this we now are resolved and determined, — That we never will sell any more. The experience of all the tribes, south and east, Has fully convinced us of late. If we their example shall follow, that we Will soon — very soon — share their fate. We wish that our children, and grandchildren too, A living in comfort may draw From the land the Great Spirit our forefathers gave, Ere white men the land ever saw. IS THE WORLD ANY WORSE? 77 We therefore determined to lease them ; and friends* In different parts of the land, Having learned our desire — being willing that we Should continue a national band — Have offered to take our lands upon lease, And pay us a generous rent — A rent upon which our children can live; And to this the Oneidas consent. We were loth to affront you again, as we did. By an offer to lease them to you, And therefore agreed to proposals from friends, And trust they will full justice do. Brothers, since we have been thus on the road, A lying, bad bird has passed by ; It has reached, as we hear, your great council fire. And told you — -yes, told you a lie: That we have not leased our lands, as we say. Brothers, that tale is not true; And we hope you will treat it as false, which it is; We've leased them, but not unto you. Brothers and chiefs, we are surprised very much To hear you are angry of late. Because others have taken a thing which your chiefs Thought beneath them, the nation, or State; But, BROTHERS, we are more surprised yet to learn You are claiming a right never known — The right to control the disposal of lands You acknowledge to be all our own. As much as the game that we take in the chase; Why, then, let us ask, do you say That the Indians shall not dispose of them just As we please, without your yea or nay? If one of our braves to your market should go With fur skins, you might then just as well Point out him a buyer, and say to him thus : " To no other man can you sell.'' Brothers, we wish 3'ou'd consider it well; Do us justice, and do not refuse ; ••^lyivingston & Company. 78 RURAL RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. We have leased our whole country, excepting what we Have reserved for the tribe still to use. We doubt not the people will pay us the rent, The rent they agreed they would pay. If you can encourage its settlement, do ; This is all that we now have to say. Witness: Jacob Reed, Secretary. his Peter B. Ten Broeck, Peter X Salekarenghis. mark his George Stinson, Jr. Daniel X Segoaneghsriser. mark his Hendrick X Sahonwate. mark Personally appeared before me the above subscribers, and acknowledged the foregoing instrument to be their voluntary act and deed. Acknowledged before me, this 12th day of March, 1788. Henry I. V. Renssellaer, One of the Judges of the Inferior Court of the County of Columbia. Charley. — A pretty good talk, the way you have fixed it up ; but do you think it's a genuine Indian talk, or was it some of L,ivingston's company got it up for them? Ben. — I should not wonder if Livingston & Company were at the bottom of it ; but you see it is subscribed to by the Indian chiefs and authenticated by a judge's cer- tificate, which goes to show that men at that day could pull the wires as well as they can now, when somebody is to be swindled. Charley. — But do you think it means the same the way you've rhymed it that it did originally? Ben. — Yes, I think so. Charley. — Well, Peter Pinkard is going to speak Pat- rick Henry's great lyiberty or Death speech at the exhibi- tion, and if j^ou'll just change it into rhyme as you did the Indians' talk, I'll speak it too, and leave it to the teacher to say whether it's the same old speech or another one. Ben. — Very well; that's a talk of the olden time, and if you will agree to study it well and speak it properly, I'll fix it up for you. Charley. — I'll do that, certain. - IS THE WORLD ANY WORSE? 79 "GTVE ME LIBERTY, OR GIVE ME DEATH!" I know it is natural for man to indulge In illusions that hope often brings To close his eyes against truth, and to heed The song that the false siren sings ; But is it the part of the wise, I would ask, Who are struggling for freedom and life, To list to the charm that will transform to beasts — To surrender the struggle and strife? Are we now disposed of that number to be. Who, though having eyes, refuse to discern The danger before them, and turn a deaf ear To their greatest and grandest concern? For my part, whatever of anguish may come. Whatever of grief it may cost, I am willing, desirous, to kaow the whole truth; To know and prepare for the worst. I have but one lamp my footsteps to guide — 'Tis experience ; to that I hold fast. There is no better way of the future to judge Than to look at the things of the past; And judging of coming events by the past, I would wish and would ask now to know What things we have seen in the ten years that's passed, That warrant our hoping on so ? What have gentlemen seen or what see they now, In the conduct of those who bear rule In the British dominion, that solaces tliem. While they call on us here to " keep cool " ? Say, is it the bland and insidious smile That late our petitions received ? Ah ! trust not to it ; a snare it will prove — IvCt freemen be never deceived ! Take heed to yourselves, and be not entrapped Nor betrayed by a Judas's kiss ; When gracious receptions and speeches you hear. Then ask yourselves questions like this: How gracious receptions and speeches compare With preparations so war-like and grand ; 8o RURAL RHYMES AND OLDEN TIMES. Preparations that cover our waters with ships, And darken with soldiers our land? Are large fleets of ships and armies of men Necessary to bring about love, To reconcile friends that have once been estranged? 'Tis the hawk reconciling the dove. Have we shown ourselves so unwilling to be Reconciled to our mother and friend That force and coercion can alone bring us back On the arm of King George to depend? L